I was crawlin’, damn near gettin’ undressed. I had the little girls goin’

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At New York’s Apollo Theater, the amateur night audience was so tough, “they would boo their own mama off the stage,” according to Rufus Thomas. “But they weren’t as tough as Memphis.” There were one-legged dancers, jugglers, comics, glass eaters, and blues singers of all ages and ilk. If the audience did not like the performer, they threw paper bags in winter, tomatoes in summer. No simple hook like the Apollo; if the would-be star was booed and pelted and still would not give up, the audience would raise such an uproar that the “Lord High Executioner” would leap from the wings and shoot him with a pearl-handled revolver. Usually one blank shot would do it, but the Executioner would not hesitate to empty his gun if necessary to remove the reluctant amateur.