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City Council prohibits dance marathons on January 26, 1931.
HistoryLink.org Essay 5601 : Printer-Friendly Format On January
26, 1931, Bellingham City Council passes Ordinance No. 5204
prohibiting “continuous performance,” i.e. dance marathons. A
dance marathon being staged concurrently at the State Street
Auditorium prompts the Council's emergency measure. Dance
marathons (often called Walkathons) are human endurance contests
in which couples dance almost non-stop for hundreds of hours (as
long as a month or two), competing for prize money. Dance
marathons were spectator events and performative endurance
contests. Audiences paid 10 cents to 25 cents to watch
contestants shuffle, sleep on their feet, dance, and entertain
24 hours a day. Contestants could rest 12 minutes out of every
hour, and were fed 12 times each day. They were subjected to
elimination events that grew increasingly sadistic as the
marathon wore on. Post No. 1585 of the Veterans o