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

Browse Items (67 total)

  • Collection: Historical squares
Document

"Social Dancing in America" - Rod LaFarge

This lengthy history of social dance was written by Rod LaFarge and appeared over three years in American Squares magazine. LaFarge begins with a short look at English country dance, moves to dancing… View item
Document

Social Dance in the Mormon West

Detailed look at the role that social dance played (and still plays) in Mormon society. The publication includes a lengthy essay by Larry Shumway looking at dance throughout Mormon history, including… View item
Document

1976 Square Dance Historical Pageant

Cal Campbell provides this account of the production of the historical pageant at the 1976 National Square Dance Convention. View item
Document

American Square Dancing - 1976 NSDC historical pageant

This is the program, prepared by Cal Campbell, that accompanied the square dance historical pageant at the 1976 National Square Dance Convention in Anaheim, CA. See the next item in the SDHP… View item
Moving Image

Beseda Quadrille, part I

František Bonuš, a noted dance pedagogue from Prague, led a quadrille workshop in Berea, Kentucky in 1987. The video of the entire workshop is lengthy and has been edited and divided into nine parts.… View item
Moving Image

Caribbean Quadrille - Dominica

This is but one example of a quadrille tradition that has been kept alive in many Caribbean islands, here performed by Dominica Oversea Nationals Association (DONA) - Quadrille Dancers. View item
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Contredanse française – La réverbère

Dance from the later 1700s, during the reign of Louis VXI (1754-1793), illustrating this dance form that emerged from the cotillon and led to the development of the quadrille. View item
Moving Image

Cotillon

French dancing masters in the early 18th century created a dance for two couples called the cotillon. This morphed into the cotillion and later became the quadrille. The opening minutes of this… View item
Moving Image

Cotillon - Dezais

This performance shows one of fourcotillons described by Jaques Dezais in his 1725Premier livre de contre-dances. View item
Website

Cotillon website

These detailed website pages are created by Moira Goff, a self-described "baroque dance specialist." They document her research into various dances of the period with a special look at thecotillon,… View item
Moving Image

Danish Lancers, first figure

La Dorset, 1st figure of the Lancers as danced today in Denmark. Subsequent videos at this YouTube site show the other four figures. View item
Still Image

Description of a Quadrille, 1870, West Virginia

Satirical description of a quadrille, from a West Virginia newspaper; no mention is made of a caller View item