I'm Clarice Smith, and I sing and dance in a black vaudeville show.
Vaudeville is the name performers have given to the many traveling shows that move from town to town throughout America.
Vaudeville shows can have singers, dancers, musicians, jugglers, and magicians and they play in big cities and small towns.
Some vaudeville people even perform in tents!
They rent out a farmer's field, put up a tent, and use oil lamps for stage lights.
I've been in vaudeville since 1900, when I was 16, and I have performed in big shows and small shows in a thousand different places.
Sometimes, when my husband Charlie and I are performing with a big show with lots of stars, we travel in our own railroad car.
But we've been in small shows too, with just a piano player and a comedian, and then we drive from place to place in an old car.
Growing up, I'd watch boys sing and dance on the street corner, and people would throw them pennies.
It gave me the idea that I could make some money the same way.
We were poor and nobody took dance or music lessons, so I learned songs from the boys.
I'd just sing and move my feet any way that I liked.
People enjoyed my singing so much they threw me nickels, which I gave to my mama since she didn't make much money washing people's clothes.
My lucky break came when one of the most popular shows in the South came to my little town.
The show was Crackling Charlie and the Butterbeans, and they were wonderful.
The Butterbeans were the best band I'd ever seen, and they could really get people dancing.
I was 13 the first time I saw Charlie.
He was the leader of the band and he stopped to see me dance and sing on the street. He gave me a dollar!
The next time he came to town I was 14, and he gave me another dollar and a red ribbon.
Two years later Charlie came to my house and asked Mama if I could join his show and marry him too.
I knew that joining the show would be much better than doing laundry like Mama,
so I told her that I was going with Charlie whether she agreed to let me go or not.
Mama said yes, so Charlie and I got married. Suddenly I was in show business!
Right away the piano player taught me some new songs and showed me how to sing them in a way that made people take notice.
I soon realized that performing on stage was a lot different than singing on the street, so I paid close attention to my costumes.
I sewed beads on a headband that I wore onstage, so that when the lights flashed on those beads, I sparkled!
I sewed fringe on some of my dresses too, and I looked so wonderful, people couldn't stop clapping when I sang.
But performing is hard work too, because in vaudeville you need to be a great entertainer and develop different talents.
You have to learn new things and practice all the time.
For example, it took Charlie and me a whole week to learn a new kind of tap dancing called the soft shoe.
It was a popular dance that everybody wanted to see, so all the vaudeville performers started putting that dance in their shows.
Taps are small pieces of metal on the bottoms of your shoes that make a nice click-click-click when you dance.
For the soft shoe, we took the taps off and danced quietly on sand that we'd put on the floor ahead of time.
Our feet made a nice swishing sound, and the audience loved it!
Since it's against the law for whites and blacks to work or socialize together, there are separate theaters for white and black people.
Charlie and I have performed at many famous black theaters in the country,
such as the Douglass Theater in Macon, Georgia;
the Liberty in Chattanooga, Tennessee; and even Gibson's Standard Theater in Philadelphia.
Sometimes we're in town for a week and sometimes we stay only a day.
But I always pack enough food to take with us when we're on the road, because black people aren't allowed to eat in most restaurants.
The local hotels won't let us rent rooms either, so whenever we get to a town, we usually stay at someone's home.
It costs thirty cents to see our show, which is a good price for such a lot of entertainment.
Of course the performers only make about $30 a week each, because the theater owner usually takes most of admission price.
Right now our show has a full band and a magician too.
Most of the time, we do four performances a day, seven days a week.
Recently Charlie and I have been doing a new comedy routine.
We come out on stage dancing, and we look happy.
Then I stop dancing and say, "Charlie, you talk too much.
Sometimes I wish you were like a town clock."
"Why, honey?" he asks.
"Because then you'd only speak once an hour," I answer.
The audience always laughs at that.
Charlie and I do a few more dance steps.
Then I stop and say, "Charlie, what's the difference between a teacher and an engineer?"
"I don't know, honey. What is the difference?" he asks.
"One trains the mind and the other minds the train," I answer.
The audience loves to see a married couple tell jokes.
Sometimes Charlie asks me if I want to settle down and have children, and he talks about getting a little place with enough land to farm.
But times are hard and we don't have enough money saved right now, so I want to keep on singing and dancing as long as I can.
If you ever want to have a good time, look for Crackling Charlie and his Clarice.
We'll be looking for you, and the Butterbeans will be right behind us playing their hearts out.