December 25, 1895: The Legend of Stagger Lee

Lloyd Price

December 25, 1895: The legend of "Stagger Lee" is born. Lee Shelton, a black pimp known as "Stack" or "Stacker" Lee, ran an, um, entertainment venue called the Four Hundred Club in St. Louis. He and William Lyons, also involved in the St. Louis underworld, were drinking in the Bill Curtis Saloon. They began to argue, and Lyons took Shelton's Stetson hat off his head. For this offense, Shelton shot Lyons, killing him.

Shelton was convicted, served 12 years for murder, was imprisoned again for robbery, and died in prison in 1912.

As early as 1897, during Shelton's trial, the 1st song about the murder was performed. It spread throughout American music, black and white alike, and, depending on the singer's accent, the perpetrator (and thus the title) could be "Stack-o-Lee," "Stag-o-Lee," "Stacker Lee," "Stagger Lee," and so on. The legendary New Orleans pianist Mac "Dr. John" Rebennack claimed that there were so many versions, he could sing the song for half an hour and never repeat a verse.

Eventually, "Stagger Lee" became the best-known version. But the song, as most people know it now, gets the details wrong: In most versions, "Stagger Lee" and "Billy" are shooting dice in an alley late at night, and Billy, having already won Stagger Lee's Stetson hat, tries to cheat him. So Stagger Lee goes home, gets his gun, goes to the bar, and, despite Billy pleading for his life -- "I got three little children and a very... sickly wife!" -- shoots him. (I wonder if one of the versions that Dr. John knew went, "I got three little children and a very... ugly wife!")

Fred Waring & His Pennsylvanians became the 1st white act to record it, in 1923. Lloyd Price hit Number 1 with it in 1959, but there was a problem: It was on ABC-Paramount Records, and ABC not only owned the label, but aired American Bandstand. That show couldn't have the Number 1 song in the country played for teenagers, on live national daytime television, with the words, "Stagger Lee shot Billy, oh, he shot that poor boy so bad, 'til the bullet came through Billy and it broke the bartender's glass!" (How did that couplet get past 1950s censors in the first place?)

So they had Price record a cleaned-up version, in which Billy stole Stagger Lee's girlfriend, but he feels bad about it, and gives her back, and the guys make up, and are both alive at the end. The way to tell the difference is at the beginning: In the original version, Price sings, in his New Orleans accent, "The night was Claire," while in the cleaned-up version, he sings it straight, "The night was clear." In both versions, "the Moon was yellow, and the leaves came tumbling down" -- making the opening a haiku (five syllables, then seven, then five), and also suggesting that the song takes place in  Autumn, several weeks before Christmas.

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December 25, 1895 was a Wednesday. Baseball was out of season, hockey was all-amateur, basketball was a recent invention, and this was before college football was playing bowl games, let alone on Christmas Day.

But in England, soccer, or "football" as they call it, had a tradition: To keep traveling to a minimum, and thus families together, 2 nearby teams would play at one's home ground on Christmas Day, and at the other's on the next day, December 26, Boxing Day. This tradition began to die out in the 1950s, but Boxing Day games are still played.

On December 25, 1895, the London-based team which I would eventually support, then known as Woolwich Arsenal, played, but not against a nearby team: They hosted Burslem Port Vale, at the Manor Ground in Plumstead, Kent, later to be a part of Southeast London, and won, 2-1.

August 5, 1957: "American Bandstand" Goes National

August 5, 1957: American Bandstand, previously a local program on WFIL-Channel 6, the Philadelphia affiliate on ABC, is taken national by the network.

The show, titled just Bandstand, began on October 7, 1952, running weekdays, Monday through Friday, hosted by Bob Horn, as basically a televised extension of his radio show on WFIL, 560 on the AM dial, a.k.a. "The Famous 56."

Essentially, it was Horn introducing records, and, while the record played, teenagers would be shown dancing at the WFIL studio at 46th Street and Market Street in West Philadelphia, across 46th from the Philadelphia Arena, 3 miles west of City Hall. But Horn was fired on July 9, 1956, after being arrested for drunk driving.

Another WFIL disc jockey got the job: Dick Clark. On August 5, 1957, the show went national, as American Bandstand. The timing was exquisite: Within a few weeks, a doo-wop group from South Philadelphia, Danny & The Juniors, came along with a song they'd recorded titled "Do the Bop." Clark had a sense for such things, and told them the bop was on its way out as a dance, and suggested a new title, "At the Hop," because dance halls invited teenagers to take their shoes off, and dance in their socks, calling the dances "sock hops."

Clark wasn't completely right. True, the stroll came along and replaced the bop as the top teenage dance in America. But the re-recorded "At the Hop" made his prediction a self-contradicting prophecy: By playing the song on Bandstand, people around the country saw kids doing the bop, and it got a second wind. By the end of 1957, "At the Hop" was the Number 1 song in America, and remained so for the first few weeks of 1958.

Clark and the Juniors helped each other: The first "veejay" (video disc jockey) made the group famous, and the group raised the show's profile. Kids rushed home form school in time to turn to Channel 7 and watch Bandstand. (Not every ABC affiliate was a Channel 7, but they were in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and several other cities.)

And so, in 1958, with Elvis Presley in the U.S. Army, Little Richard stepping aside to enter the ministry, Jerry Lee Lewis marrying himself into scandal, and Chuck Berry going to prison under the Mann Act, American Bandstand introduced America to rock acts both new and established, and helped ensure, as Danny & The Juniors said in their follow-up to "At the Hop," "Rock and Roll Is Here to Stay." Bandstand did as much as anything else to ensure that this would be true.

On September 7, 1963, Bandstand was moved to become a weekly show, airing after ABC's Saturday morning cartoons. And on February 8, 1964 -- the day between the Beatles' arrival in New York and their groundbreaking performance on The Ed Sullivan Show -- American Bandstand began broadcasting from the ABC Television Center in Los Angeles. It continued to air from there, with Clark earning the nickname "The World's Oldest Teenager," until its last show, on October 7, 1989, the show's 37th anniversary.

That same day that Bandstand moved west, WFIL moved out of the 46th & Market studio to its current studio on City Line Avenue, 5 miles northwest of City Hall. On May 1, 1971, the station's call letters became WPVI, which they remain to this day: P for Philadelphia, and VI for the Roman numeral 6. I can hear "Closer to Your World," the Action News theme, now.

Bob Horn tried to rebuild his life by moving to Houston, where a former boss hired him at KILT, under the name Bob Adams. In 1966, while mowing his lawn in that famously hot city, he died of heatstroke. He was only 50 years old.

Clark was considerably more fortunate. While Bandstand was in L.A., he formed Dick Clark Productions, which is still in business. And he began producing and hosting all kinds of shows, including the game show Pyramid and, starting on December 31, 1971, the nationally-broadcast Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve. In 2004, he suffered a stroke, and Ryan Seacrest has hosted the show ever since, with Clark making brief appearances close to midnight until his death in 2012.

An Aldi supermarket is now on the site of the original Bandstand studio.

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August 5, 1957 was a Monday. Only 2 baseball games were played that day. The New York Yankees lost to the Cleveland Indians,7-2 at Yankee Stadium. Mike Garcia outpitched Don Larsen. Mickey Mantle went 0-for-1... with 4 walks. Former Yankee Gene Woodling went 2-for-5 with a home run and 5 RBIs. He was later replaced for defensive purposes by a rookie and future Yankee: Roger Maris.

And the Brooklyn Dodgers beat their arch-rivals, the New York Giants, 5-2 at Ebbets Field. Rookie Don Drysdale outpitched Ray Crone. Gino Cimoli went 3-for-4 with an RBI. Willie Mays went 4-for-5 with a home run and 2 RBIs.

January 6, 1979: The Village People Introduce "Y.M.C.A."

Top: Felipe Rose.

Middle row, left to right: Randy Jones, David Hodo,

Glenn Hughes and Alex Briley.

Front: Victor Willis.

January 6, 1979: The ABC music show American Bandstand -- having long since left its five-days-a-week format and its Philadelphia studio for Saturdays only and Los Angeles -- has The Village People as guests. It includes the debut of the hand gestures from their song "Y.M.C.A."

The Village People, named after New York's Greenwich Village, were:

* Victor Willis, 27, from San Francisco, the lead singer, who dressed in a police uniform, except when they sang "In the Navy," when he wore the uniform of a U.S. Navy Admiral.

* Alex Briley, 31, from New York, who dressed as a soldier, and was called "The G.I.," except when they sang "In the Navy," when he wore the uniform of an old-time enlisted-man sailor.

* David Hodo, 31, from Sacramento, who dressed as a construction worker.

* Glenn Hughes, 28, from New York, who wore a leather suit, making him look like a member of a motorcycle gang.

* Randy Jones, 26, from Raleigh, North Carolina, who dressed as a cowboy. No relation to the star major league pitcher of the same name at that time.

* Felipe Rose, 24, from New York, who dressed as a Native American.

The song had been released as a single on October 17, 1978, a few hours before the New York Yankees beat the Los Angeles Dodgers to win the World Series. But, up until January 6, 1979, the song had only been heard, not seen. Although music videos were already a thing, no one thought to make a video of this song before the Bandstand appearance.

What is the song about? Funny you should ask. It sounds like a representative of the YMCA, the Young Men's Christian Association, is offering his organization's help to a young man who needs it. This did reflect real life, somewhat: The YMCA had run single room occupancy facilities to house people looking for work in cities. By the 1970s, most YMCA residents were homeless people and troubled youth.

Willis had said that he wrote the song as a reflection of the fun activities that urban black youth experienced at YMCAs, such as basketball and swimming. That's what he meant -- or said he meant -- by, "They have everything for young men to enjoy. You can hang out with all the boys."

Except the song was implicitly understood as celebrating YMCAs' reputation as popular sports for gay cruising and hookups, particularly for the younger men to whom it was addressed. The fact that disco music had already become a big part of gay culture didn't help the song's reputation. Homophobes had long accused gay people of preying on underage boys, and this song made that perception worse.

Furthermore, half the members of the Village people were gay not just in character, but in real life: Hughes, Jones and Rose. So was Jacques Morali, the French-Morrocan music producer who created the group and wrote most of their songs. Willis was not only straight, he was the 1st husband of actress Phylicia Rashad, before she divorced him and married football player-turned-sportscaster Ahmad Rashad.

I mentioned the Yankees. Starting in 1996, when they dragged the infield between the 5th and 6th innings, the Yankee Stadium groundskeeping crew came out with "Y.M.C.A." playing over the loudspeakers, and, when the song got to spelling it out, they dropped their various implements, faced home plate, and formed the letters with their arms, like the group. And the fans, many of them unaware of what the song was about, sang along.

Since the Yankees won the World Series again that year -- for the 1st time since literally the day the song was released, 18 years earlier -- the bit caught on, and, ever since, the grounds crew have done it, and the fans along with them. Everyone ignored the predatory aspect of it, and considered it good, clean fun.

But a more sinister side to it developed. The Bleachers at Yankee Stadium were, by this point, pretty much the only cheap seats left, so it was a blue-collar section. The "Bleacher Creatures" were mainly locals, Puerto Ricans and Dominicans from The Bronx, and Italian guys from over the George Washington Bridge in New Jersey. This meant that they were Catholics, and this often carries anti-gay prejudice.

So when they saw someone in the Bleachers wearing an opposing team's gear, they would wait for "Y.M.C.A." to be cued up, and then they would surround him. They wouldn't lay a finger on him, so he couldn't say he was harmed; but neither could he escape until the song was over and they dispersed. And the Creatures had their own lyrics for the song, implying that anybody who would wear an opposing team's cap or jersey into these Bleachers must also be gay. Instead of "Y.M.C.A.," it was "Why are you gay?" And the lyrics got really raunchy. In 2010, a full year after the move to the new Yankee Stadium, stadium security finally decided enough was enough, and began throwing fans doing it out of the Stadium.

Donald Trump also likes to "dance" along to the song at his political rallies. He doesn't have a clue as to what the song is about, either. (He doesn't have a clue about a lot of things.) One would think that, if he were going to dance to a Village People song, it would be "Macho Man" -- ignoring the gay subtext of that song as well. Or maybe "In the Navy," with its refrain of "We want you! We want you! We want you as a new recruit!" to gain recruits for his cause. This, of course, ignores the fact that Trump has called America's military men and veterans "losers" and "suckers."

He also seems to have forgotten the words

"No man does it all by himself.
I say, Young man, put your pride on the shelf."

In 1979, Saturday Night Live did a parody of disco: Garrett Morris was the Cop, John Belushi the Indian, Dan Aykroyd the Leatherman, Bill Murray the Construction Worker, his brother Brian Doyle-Murray the Sailor, and Don Novello (better known as Father Guido Sarducci) the Cowboy. Together, to parody Chuck Berry's 1956 hit "Roll Over Beethoven," which mocked the classical music of anti-rock parents, they sang, "Bend over, Chuck Berry, disco is here to stay!" And, since it was late on Saturday night, they got away with it.

But the tide was turning. On July 12, 1979, "Disco Demolition Night" was held at Comiskey Park in Chicago, and it turned into an anti-disco riot. A few days later, the Village People were being filmed for a disco-themed movie, when Willis left the group. He was replaced by one of the group's backup singers, Ray Simpson, brother of songwriting legend Valerie Simpson. The film was released in 1980, as Can't Stop the Music. Not only did it tank at the box office, it got some of the worst reviews in movie history.

To people born in the 21st Century, "Y.M.C.A." and its gestures must seem like something we made up years after the fact, to parody the Silly Seventies. Surely, like Elvis Presley with "Hound Dog," the Beatles with "She Loves You" and its chorus of "Yeah, yeah, yeah!", the Jefferson Airplane with "White Rabbit" symbolizing hippiedom and psychedelia, the Human League with "Don't You Want Me" symbolizing early 1980s synth-pop, and Nirvana with Kurt Cobain's indecipherable lyrics on "Smells Like Teen Spirit" symbolizing grunge, such things were made up after the fact, to stand in as symbols of the respective genres, and to make them look silly. But, no: In each case, these people, and these songs, actually existed at the time.

Group creator and producer Jacques Morali died of AIDS in 1991, at age 44. Glenn Hughes, the Leatherman, died of lung cancer in 2001, at 50. As of January 6, 2022, the other members are still alive.

UPDATE: Victor Willis died in 2026, just before what would have been his 75th birthday.

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January 6, 1979 was a Saturday. Baseball was out of season. The NFL was between rounds of the Playoffs. There were 8 games in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks beat the San Antonio Spurs, 108-105 at Madison Square Garden. Bob McAdoo scored 38 points for the Knicks, leading all scorers on the day.

* The Phoenix Suns beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 143-139 in overtime at The Spectrum in Philadelphia.

* The Washington Bullets beat the Atlanta Hawks, 106-102 at The Omni in Atlanta.

* The Cleveland Cavaliers beat the New Orleans Jazz, 105-94 at the Superdome in New Orleans.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 115-112 in overtime at The Summit in Houston. (The arena is now the Central Campus of televangelist Joel Osteen's Lakewood Church.)

* The Milwaukee Bucks beat the San Diego Clippers, 104-93 at the Milwaukee Exposition & Convention Center Arena, a.k.a. The MECCA. (It's now the UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena.)

* The Kansas City Kings beat the Indiana Pacers, 120-99 at the Kemper Arena (now the Hy-Vee Arena) in Kansas City.

* And the Denver Nuggets beat the Boston Celtics, 127-98 at the McNichols Arena in Denver.

There were 7 games in the NHL:

* The New York Islanders beat the Philadelphia Flyers beat the Philadelphia Flyers, 5-1 at the Nassau Coliseum.

* The Montreal Canadiens beat the Vancouver Canucks, 2-0 at the Montreal Forum.

* In an "Original Six" matchup, the Chicago Black Hawks, 5-3 at Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto.

* The Los Angeles Kings beat the Pittsburgh Penguins, 4-3 at the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh.

* The Washington Capitals beat the Detroit Red Wings, 4-1 at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.

* The Boston Bruins beat the Minnesota North Stars, 5-2 at the Metropolitan Sports Center in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.

* The Colorado Rockies beat the St. Louis Blues, 4-1 at the Checkerdome, as the St. Louis Arena was then known.

* And the New York Rangers, the Buffalo Sabres and the Atlanta Flames were not scheduled.

There was 1 game in the World Hockey Association. With several teams having gone bankrupt, the league made deals with a team of Soviet All-Stars and the national team of Czechoslovakia to play 1 game each against each of the remaining WHA teams. On this day, the Czechs beat the Cincinnati Stingers, 4-1 at the Riverfront Coliseum (now the Heritage Bank Center) in Cincinnati.

And in English soccer, among the games played in the 3rd Round of the FA Cup, Arsenal, the North London team I would eventually come to support, went to Yorkshire, and played Sheffield Wednesday to a 1-1 draw at Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield.

They would have a replay at Highbury in North London on January 9, and this would also end 1-1. They played again on January 15, on neutral ground in Leicester in the Midlands, and it ended 2-2. They had a 3rd replay, on January 17, also at Leicester, and it ended 3-3. Finally, on January 22, also at Leicester, Arsenal won, 2-0. Yes, having 4 replays was unusual, even then. Now, if a 2nd replay ends level, extra time is held; if still, then penalty kicks.

Ever since, to the tune of "Pomp and Circumstance," Arsenal fans have sung, "We all follow The Arsenal, over land and sea -- and Leicester!" Arsenal went on to win the Cup.