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Comus Club History
Early in 1929, a group
of husbands and wives, who were regular members of the
Bellingham Bay Masonic Lodge #44, decided to take a big step. They faithfully
attended lodge meetings every Friday evening, but they realized that when they
left the Masonic Hall that they were all “dressed up” in tuxedos and long
dresses, and with “no particular place to go!” So, once a month, they decided to
put their elegant attire to good use by forming a dance and supper club!
After the lodge
meetings that were held on the second Friday of each
month, these Masons would go to the Bellingham Golf and Country Club, have an
elegant dinner, and dance to a live band. (Venues would vary from time to time
over the years, but the BGCC was always their favorite place to have these
events!)
They named their new
supper and dance club “COMUS” after the mythical god
of “festivity and revelry.” Soon, these Masons would invite non-Masons to join,
and the club very quickly became totally detached from any and all of its
original Masonic “roots.”
In the early years,
the club instituted a “program” dance format. Its
members were each given a printed program upon which numbered dances would be
listed. During cocktail time the blanks beside each dance on the list would be
filled with the names of the spouses with whom the members would
dance. Throughout the evening the band would play music that would vary in
rhythm and style to fit the listed dance steps (fox-trot, two-step, waltz,
shuffle, swing, polka, schottische, three-step, etc.)
Inspired by Comus
Club, other local dance clubs were established, but
all of them eventually fell by the wayside. To name a few, there were the
Thirty-And-Six Club (est. in 1936), McComba Club, Danza Club, Encore Club,
Forty-and-Eight Club (est. in 1948 at the American Legion after the GI’s
returned from WWII), and Clipper Club, whose first official dance was held at
the Fairhaven Hotel the very night the hotel burnt to the ground!
The oldest dance club
of all, COMUS Club, yet remains, carrying with it the
same commitment to formality, festivity, and fun with which it was originally
established. The organization continues to offer its members and their guests
the best opportunity in Northwest Washington to dress in formal attire,
participate in an elegant social hour and dinner, visit with great people, and
dance to fabulous live music.
Notes courtesy of Past
President, Mark Schlichting (58), with the help of Past Presidents George (88)
and Marjorie (85) Davenport, September 2006
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