Out here, in the Ole West, the dance was considered to be something of a heathen ritual atrributed mostly to the darker angels of the lower stata. When anyone was found to be exhibiting signs of such gyrations, they were immediately taken into custody by the local "Matt Dillon" and put in the "Pokey", so named for the incarceration and, hopefully, purification of such adherents. Of course, if, while in the throes of their riotous ecstacy, they committed some other, more heinous crime, or if they spouted even tiny "divil knobs" on the tops of their heads, they were treated to a new kind of dance, the next day after being "poh keed", that is the "Dance of the Dangling Rope".

Owen Whistler refered to this in his "Study of the Early Range Terrirorial Practice of Law and Heathenism, as it Related to the Open Range of the Wyoming, Dakota, and Colorado Territories". He made mention of the fact that plenty of cattle rustlers were reluctant, but active, never-the-less, participants in a variation of the same "Dangling Rope" dance, sometimes with colourful variations. Rather than throw the rope over a tree, which was often hard to find, inventive lawmen and rabblerousers would find the nearest telegraph pole, barn pulley, or crossbar with which to facilitate the dancers.

One of the strangest customs mentioned in the book, is a penchant they had for immortalising the inevitable demise of all Dangling Rope dancers through the use of photography. Even today, these lasting images impart an eerie sense of what it must be like to partake in such a dance. Those who even thought of performing the HokeyPokey must have been either very brave or insane to have risked such punishment. It is said that the analogy of "sure if ya think yer dancing such an innocent little thing like the HokeyPokey, doncha know you'll end up in some gutter, used up and burnt out, fit only for the dreaded Dangling Rope Dance?"

At one point, Whistler, points out there was declared an all out "War on the HokeyPokey" wherein children especially were asked to "just say no!" in order to fend off the temptations of its lascivious ways. These warnings, apprarently continued on into this century until they were eclipsed by the never before seen gyrations of the ElvisPelvis, icon of the rocknroll era. eventually the Dangling Rope dance was done away with and teh sad remnants of the original HokeyPokey were taught to innocent schoolchildren as a quaint, old folkdance. But sometimes an elder raises their eyebrows, smirks their lips, and make the sign against the evil eye, for in their dimmist memories, they remembered the "divil" dance of the old days and the wretched path it led one down.

Excerpt from "Origins of the Western Dance" by KattleKate of LooseGow Ranch, Wyoming 1919