Square Dance History Project
The rich story of North American square dance finally has a home in the digital age.

Browse Items (77 total)

  • Subject is exactly "Southern / Appalachian / Big sets"
Moving Image

Square dancing at Augusta Heritage Festival - 1994

An evening dance at the Augusta Workshops in Elkins, West Virginia on July 15, 1994. Larry Edelman calls the figures to the music of the New Dixie Entertainers: Mike Bryant, Marcia Bryant, Brett… View item
Sound

Big circle dance - Manny Wiener & American Square Dance Group

Caller Manny Wiener leads a big circle dance—here introduced as a Kentucky running set—with members of Margot Mayo's American Square Dance Group. This is a portion of a half hour radio… View item
Document

Swamp Country Dance

This is a first-person account of attending a country dance in Georgia in the mid-1950s. The author describes the big circle formation in detail: "A single dance would go like this; The… View item
Moving Image

Big Circle square dance - Glenn Bannerman

Glenn Bannerman, caller, leads a big circle at MerleFest, 2014 View item
Sound

Kentucky Set Running - 1917 firsthand account

After graduation from Vassar and a summer holiday with family, Marguerite Butler, at age 22, headed for Pine Mountain Settlement School in a remote area of eastern Kentucky to try to make some… View item
Document

Smoky Mountain Square Dances

NOTE: This is a large file and might take a while to load.To read the actual booklet, choose the DOWNLOAD link or select the source file located by scrolling to Additional Files.This collection,… View item
Document

Traditional Square Dance of Ocracoke Island, North Carolina

Detailed description of big set dances on Ocracoke Island, and an attempt in 1996 to re-create a dance tradition that had died out. Note: when you scroll through the PDF, you’ll see the cover page,… View item
Document

Square Dance in Haywood County, NC

Detailed look at western North Carolina, a region rich in square dance traditions including that of Sam Queen and the Soco Gap Square Dancers. Jamison starts his article with a look at the turn of the… View item
Document

Origin of Appalachian Square Dance

By ":Appalachian square dance," the author is referring to big circle or big set dances, not specifically to four-couple squares. Thurston rejects the notion that Appalachian squares did not… View item
Website

Virginia square dance, 1925, silent movie

This silent movie footage, created by Fox News, shows dancers and fiddlers recorded in an outdoor setting in Quitman [sic], Virginia. We cannot identify this location since it does not show up on… View item
Website

Traditional Square Dance Figures

One section of the Lloyd Shaw Foundation's website provides detailed instructions (and source information) for 20 figures from traditional Western and southern Appalachian squares:Arkansas… View item
Sound

Glenn Bannerman - big circle dances, audio

Two examples of big sets from western North Carolina, called by Glenn Bannerman with music from the Stoney Creek Boys. These audio files come from two recordings, "Mountain Dance Music Comes Alive"… View item