Nothing beats a good fire and brimstone speech and this is
one of the better ones. But I can’t help thinking the Globe, which hasn’t been
afraid to do its own fretting about morals on the waterfront; particularly when
it comes to men bathing naked in spaces where couples might be boating, is publishing
this in a tongue and cheek fashion. Jokes scattered throughout the Globe and
the Star at the time suggest how people in bathing suits and men and women
sharing space on the beach was something of tantalizing interest rather than
object horror.
Dancing on Beaches Shameless and Vulgar
Roman Catholic paper in Brooklyn bitterly denounces practice
Canadian press dispatch
Brooklyn, NY., July 16—Dancing on the beach in bathing suits
has called down the denunciation of the parish paper of the Roman Catholic
church of the Nativity, in Madison Street, near Classon avenue, Brooklyn, of
which the Rev. L. Belford is rector
“The shameless and unspeakably vulgar dances that are done
on the beach at Brighton,” is the way article speaks of them and goes on to say:
“But one degree, and that a very thin degree, removed from
nudity, these shameless creatures, locked in each other’s arms, whirl and sway
and bend and dip upon the sands with every evidence of sexual excitement and pleasure
for themselves and to the assembled throng. It did seem that the bottom of the
abyss had been laid bare when these same similarly attired, were permitted to
lie on the sands wrapped in each other’s arms. But now we find an orgy of
indecency in attire and in conduct that puts to shame the riots of vice which
once marked paganism.
And the authorities are saying nothing, doing nothing. Has
paganism revived, and are we going to permit its votaries to parade its rites
before thousands of decent men and women, not to speak of innocent children, whom
it must infect with its poison? For things like this was Sodom burned by an
angry God.”
The Globe
Friday July 17 1914 Page 5
