Born in a tepee in Lightning Creek, Oklahoma
In the 1920s, Reed found an ideal dance partner in comedian Willie Bryant. Together they formed a vaudeville act called "Brains as Well as Feet," and choreographed a flashy finale that was called the Shim Sham Shimmy. The routine, which was ideally suited to the line dance, is often referred to as the anthem of tap.

When his racial origins were discovered, the fair-skinned Reed was forced to stop dancing in white revues. For the next four decades, he worked in other areas of the entertainment industry. He produced shows at the Cotton Club in Chicago, entertained the troops during World War II, ran his own nightclub in Los Angeles and spent 20 years as the master of ceremonies at the Apollo Theater in New York.

Blog of Death Apr.17.04