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

Browse Items (1926 total)

Document

Cheyenne Mountain Dancers - typical program

This is a typical program presented by the Cheyenne Mountain Dancers, Lloyd Shaw's demonstration team of high school students. View item
Document

Dorothy Shaw - reminiscence

Two anecdotes abut Dorothy Stott Shaw, written by Dena Fresh, a student at the Cheyenne Mountain School and a member of the Cheyenne Mountain Dancers. View item
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Golden State Round Up 1964

Grand march at the Golden State Round Up, Oakland, CA, 1964. Each row is 4 squares, and there are about 50 rows That's 200 squares, or 1600 dancers. The event featured live music, with an 11… View item
Website

Scottish Country Dance - 4 couple squares

Most Scottish country dances are done as four-couple longways sets. There are, however, dances in square sets, and this Scottish Country Dancing Dictionary provides a brief overview of the formation. View item
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Ed Durlacher - Central Park, photos

Photographs documenting Ed Durlacher's series of dances in Central Park, New York City. These date from August, 1946. View item
Document

Swing yore partner round 'n round (The Desert Magazine, 1944)

Author Oren Arnold describes square dancing in Arizona in the early 1940s: "...A rock fireplace big enough to stand in was at one end of the room, and its blaze made dancing shadows… View item
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Carcassonne big set, #1

This is an excellent example of traditional southern Appalachian big set square dance, recorded by John Ramsay in Carcassonne, Kentucky, September 19, 1991. ("Big set" is the name given by outsiders;… View item
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Carcassonne big set, #2

This is another example of traditional southern Appalachian big set square dance, recorded by John Ramsay in Carcassonne, Kentucky, September 19, 1991. With relatively few examples on our site of… View item
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Nils Fredland - Birdie in the Cage and Seven Hands Round

Birdie in the Cage is a traditional square dance figure and a common one; a search for "birdie" on this SDHP website will bring up more than half a dozen other examples. In this version, each of the… View item
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Dudley Laufman - Monadnock Muddle

This dance comes from the repertoire on the great New England caller, Ralph Page, and is called here by Dudley Laufman in the "Retrospective" session at the Ralph Page Dance Legacy Weekend, January… View item
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Tin Lizzie Quadrille - Bob Dalsemer

The dance was written by Jerry Helt and recorded on MacGregor Records #816-A. Jerry writes, “It was inspired by the late Henry Ford who inspired so many of us with his ‘Tin Lizzie’!… View item
Document

Mica Flats, Idaho - traditional dance

This article describes traditional dances in Mica Flats, Idaho, eight miles south of Coeur d'Alene. It was written by Penn Fix as a chapter in his book, Contra Dancing in the Northwest. View item