Marie “Caldonia” Reynolds

Caldonia was “queer? transgender? A drag queen?” 

“No dear, Caldonia was a legend.”

Marie “Caldonia” Reynolds was a household name in Cincinnati, OH. Starting as early as the 1950s, Caldonia would arrive in Lexington via the Short Street bus station, tap dancing through the pool halls and bars of long-gone Water Street. Late in her life, when this photograph was taken, a trans woman employed Caldonia to tap dance in between numbers at her Lexington strip club.  

It was rumored–mostly by Caldonia herself–that the song “Caldonia,” made famous by B.B. King was written for this tap-dancing, gender-bending Kentucky legend.