Back in the 50s when our heroes were Hoppy, Roy and Autry, the belly roll wutn’t just a dance step… it was indecent behavior, a $25 fineable jailable offense. Or more like a permanent dent.By my 10th year the belly roll had become a sexual fantasy, but I was still too pubeless to attract a willing partner. Or Nicky and his 15-year-old brunette girlfriend (Vanna White’s future mama) in scuffed-up cheerleader shoes sweatin rivulets of baby oil as they ducked into a shorty George then smoothed out of a sugarfoot and grinded into a slow BELLY ROLL that was like switchin on the Krispy Kreme hot sign.The business half of Joan’s slender body grindin into Nicky made an impression. Mine was down at the Pavilion, ooglin the sexual antics of Jo Jo Putnam who could black it up with the best of em. Like poon pirate Roachy once said, “Lazy-eyed or hare-lipped, if you could fast dance, you got the girl.”Like seein the ocean for the first time, the allure and magic of the Jitterbug cat oozed jismic mojo.Most kid’s first sexual stir or dance chubby was oglin wiggly fannies doin the hokey pokey. It was there that collar-up jitterbug cats from the Carolinas strutted their tailor-made drapes, keychains, pomaded ducktails, pickup lines and mooch riffs. Don’t sound like much, but come sundown this ballroom of sun-baked concrete garnished with that 200-Selection Wurlitzer was the Oz of our social universe for 25 years and partner dancing headquarters.
Just a loafer landing strip of sole-worn concrete pierced with a 60’ flag-flappin flagpole, overlooking the endless Atlantic. 22 rifle booth with the bent sights.But the powdered sugar on this giant summer cupcake was always the sacred sticky of Atlantic salt, the hand in hand barefoot beach stroll and oh-so-sweet moonlit first kisses with baby-oiled, big-eyed girls in oh-so-tight britches.And for a cultish few the forbidden race music at the Pavilion with a delicious backbeat and sinful dancin.The Pavilion dance area wutn’t zackly Roseland. It was the sensual banzai of squealy screams from Roller Coaster and Round-Up riders, the dangerous clack of meshing gears, the whump of bumper cars and a bouquet of memory stapled smells… Popcorn poppin, cotton candy spun into webs of edible silk, burgers bein spatula’d, butterized corn on the cob, donuts drippin rivulets of hot grease, salty fries bein catsup’d and vinegar’d, the sweet metallic taste of electric in your mouth from the bumper cars and the nasal burn of spent ammo from the.
What Einstein did for fission, Edison did for night and Carver did for the peanut… the Pavilion, the Hill and Atlantic Beach did for southern boogie.For most kids our PAVILION was the carney magic of pinball, putt-putt, skinny/fat mirrors, the mysterious and babushka’d fortune teller booth, balloon busts with bent darts, a tap-dancin monkey and the endless quest for a Skeeball cupie doll. Specially if you grew up a slinky flip from the Myrtle Beach Pavilion, a baseball throw from the Hill and a one-hour Schwinn ride from Atlantic Beach.
MYRTLE BEACH PAVILION MEMORIESMusic, boogie and the backbeats of beach life jived like popped collars and pegged pants, rental bathing suits and jock itch.
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