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A singing telegram is a message that is delivered by an artist in a musical form. Singing telegrams are historically linked to normal telegrams, but tend to be humorous. Sometimes the artist is in costume or formal clothing.
Western Union, the American telegraph company, began offering singing telegram services in 1933. That July 28, a fan sent Hollywood singing star Rudy Vallee a birthday greeting by telegram. George P. Oslin (1899–1996), the Western Union public relations director, decided this would be a good opportunity to make telegrams, which had been associated with deaths and other tragic news, into something more popular. He asked a Western Union operator, Lucille Lipps, to sing the message over the telephone, and this became the first singing telegram.[1] While Oslin created the singing telegram because he thought "that messages should be fun," he recalled that he "was angrily informed I was making a laughingstock of the company."[2]
As relatively few telegram recipients had telephones, most telegrams, including singing telegrams, were first delivered in person. The popularization of the telephone in the 1960s reduced telegrams in general. By 1972, Western Union was receiving a small number of requests for singing telegrams and was seeking regulatory approval on a state-by-state basis to eliminate the offering.[3] Western Union suspended its singing telegram service in 1974, but independent singing telegram companies, specializing in often costumed personal delivery of gift messages, have kept up the tradition.
Variants
editThe linguistic morpheme "-gram" is also found at the end of words in combining forms to give the names of variants on the personally delivered message. These novelty telegrams are generally designed to amuse or embarrass the recipient. The message deliverers are mostly hired through a specialist commercial agency. Examples include the kissogram, strippergram, Gorillagram etc.[4]
Kissogram
editA kissogram, also called kissagram or kiss-a-gram[4] (short for kissing telegram), is a message delivered along with a kiss, usually arranged as a humorous surprise.[5] The message deliverers are typically young women who are dressed in provocative clothing.[4] The term "kissogram" was used in the TV program Doctor Who during the early 2010s to describe the profession of The Doctor's companion Amy Pond,[6] who appears in a sexy kissogram version of a police officer's uniform.[7]
Stripogram
editA stripogram or strippergram[8] is a form of message delivery in which a stripper will perform a striptease while singing or dancing. This type of entertainment became popular in the 1970s in the US and spread to Europe during the 1980s.[9] By the 1990s corporate strip-o-gram work, in which a stripper performs for clients in their workplace, was making up a significant part of the striptease business for novelty telegram services in the US.[10] Strippergrams in the UK are sometimes hired for events such as stag parties.[11] Typically a Strip-O-Gram is most often a form of gift given for a birthday, anniversary or bachelor party. A common practice is for the stripper-gram to be dressed in an outfit of one kind or another and to act out some charade connected with this, before commencing their act – for example a police officer 'arresting' somebody, a lawyer pretending to serve papers, a jilted bride and so on (sometimes this charade will be relevant to something the intended 'victim' has experienced, such as a divorce, or brush with the law). Usually a Strip-o-gram entertainer is accompanied by a chaperone, who plays her music, holds on to the money, tips and secures her safety, unlike an escort, who comes alone and does more of a one on one with the celebrant. Nowadays some agencies or performers do both to secure a bigger pay out.
Bikinigram
editA bikinigram or bikini-gram is a message delivered by a bikini-clad young woman.[12]
References
edit- ^ Liz Sadler (July 7, 2002), "Special delivery: The singing telegram endures", Columbia News Service, archived from the original on November 8, 2006.
- ^ "George Oslin, 97, creator of the singing telegram", Chicago Tribune, p. 11, October 31, 1996.
- ^ "Western Union Tuning Out Singing Telegram", The New York Times, p. 27, July 29, 1972.
- ^ a b c Mattiello, Elisa (2022). Transitional Morphology. Cambridge University Press. p. 163. ISBN 9781009168281.
- ^ "Definition of kissogram". OxfordDictionaries.com. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
- ^ Kilkelly, Daniel (18 January 2010). "New 'Who' companion 'has kissogram job'". Digital Spy. Retrieved 2018-03-23.
- ^ Jowett, Lorna (2017). Dancing with the Doctor: Dimensions of Gender in the Doctor Who Universe. Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 52. ISBN 9781786731463.
- ^ "strippergram - Wiktionary". en.wiktionary.org. Retrieved 2017-09-30.
- ^ thecelebratedmisterk (2012-03-11), Newsroom Stripper, archived from the original on 2021-12-12, retrieved 2018-03-23
- ^ "Working Woman". Working Woman magazine. Vol. 15, no. 7–12. MacDonald Communications Corporation. 1990.
- ^ Mulvihill, Natasha (2022). Experiences of the Sex Industry. Policy Press. p. 80. ISBN 9781529216578.
- ^ Vaccariello, Linda (February 1994). "Say Goodbye, Gypsy Rose Lee". Cincinnati Magazine. Vol. 27, no. 5. CM Media Inc. p. 85.