The World's Fastest Stripper (!) True Burlesque of Georgia Sothern Ecydysiast and Suspected Falsie Wearer?

Georgia Sothern.  If you look her up, Google will force Georgia SOUTHERN on you, so click through.  Thanks Google, but I know what I'm looking for. 

Georgia Sothern was really Hazel Anderson.  Plucking information from relatives who have contributed to information on the web, it appears she was once married to a fellow who ran a nightclub across from Madison Square Garden, and later to a "wealthy NY lawyer" with whom she lived happily ever after.   I am going to guess husband number one is Harry Finkelstein, who Georgia caught in a hotel room with fellow stripper Sally Rand once.  Harry claimed he was there to give the bubble dancer "medicine" but it was inappropriate enough for Georgia to have them both arrested.  Of course the press ate it up.  I believe Harry eventually married Sally!

Here is a clip by the fastest stripper in show business!  Some even say the novelty song "Hold That Tiger" was written for her.  She was also called "The Fastest Thing in Heels" at one time.  You can see why.  

There was a rumor Errol Flynn seduced her,  but she denied it.  If so, Georgia is virtually the only woman (or man) in the business not to sleep with Errol Flynn.

According to the Associated Press, Georgia once clocked Joann Collier after she accused her of wearing falsies.  Georgia said "in my trade, the wearing of falsies is impossible" but Joann later claimed she meant "in her evening dress."

Like many strippers, she started in the business before she was legal.  At age 12.  I'm not sure when she actually started peeling, but I'll guess not too soon after…and since the young woman's hips were nice, show biz pimp Minsky gave her a fake ID.  A tough life, that show business. 

Later she joined the carnival.  THAT'S a glamorous life too!

Before long, Hazel had learned the business as hired her OWN strippers which toured under the name "Sothern's Red-Headed Revue".  Other than her crazy, "chicken on amphetamine feed" dance shown here, her biggest claim to fame is providing the term "Ecdysiast" to refer to exotic dancers.  It used to mean "animals which molt" but now it means dames who strip.  Georgia was also called "dervish" and "cyclonic" among other things.  Oh…and the "bing bang bong girl."  Oh…also the "sizzling tornado."

Georgia had one of the longest careers in Burlesque.  Her first mention in the trades, apparently, was in 1935.  In 1948 she was busted for stripping too much at the Samoa Club, not her only scrap with the law.  As shown here, she posed of the cover of Calvacade of Burlesque with the great comedian and compulsive gambler Phil Silvers.

She later wrote an autobiography full of lurid details of her life in burlesque.

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