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

Browse Items (1926 total)

Website

Kitty Keller - Social Dance History

This is a series of six edited videos, selections from a 90-minute interview with social dance historian Kate Van Winkle Keller. She is a specialist in dances of the 18th century, and here she trace… View item
Document

Cotillon / Cotillion / Contredanse Française

referring to a dance in our collection:The dance is a contredanse from de la Cuisse, published in 1762. It was not called a cotillion in France. Once de la Cuisse had published his collection, the… View item
Website

Karl Byarski - Michigan fiddle and dance recordings

Paul Gifford is a researcher and musician with a particular focus on tradition Michigan fiddling. He writes:---I put up a large collection of home recordings of fiddling made by Karl Byarski, of… View item
Document

Square Dancing Atop Lookout Mountain

Article by Karen terHorst describes dancing in New Salem, Georgia, an historically-isolated community above Chattanooga, TN. The article is based on her visit to the dance in the 1970s. The dance… View item
Website

Old-Time Ozark Square Dancing

This is a detailed journal article from 1974, now available on the web. It includes a general discussion of Ozark dancing, interviews, photographs, diagrams, and descriptions of two dozen figures and… View item
Website

"Play Me Something Quick and Devilish"

Bob Holt (1930–2004) was a respected Missouri dance fiddler, a 1999 recipient of the National Heritage Fellowship. He is featured on several videotapes of Ozark style dancing in this website's… View item
Document

Revival of American Square and Country Dancing - 1949

This article documents the change on American dance floors in Michigan state in the late 1940s, where, in the author's words, "croonersare replaced bycallers." She cites the work of Grace Ryan in… View item
Document

Cape Breton Caller Interviews

Jørn Borggreen is author ofRight to the Helm, a detailed study of Cape Breton square sets as observed in 14 communities. The book, now in its 4th edition, provides documentation of the figures for… View item
Website

Floyd Woodhull

Website from upstate New York detailing life and musical career of Floyd (Woody) Woodhull, square dance caller, accordion player and band leader. Also includes a discography. View item
Sound

Square Dancing in Western New York

The New York Folklore Society produced a number of five-minute radio documentaries featuring the folklife (skills, traditions, stories, music, dance, folk art and material items) found in New York… View item
Still Image

Sets in Order - office people

This series of photographs shows some of the people involved with producingSets in Ordermagazine. The first picture shows Bob Osgood in the center at what appears to be an editorial meeting. Artist… View item
Still Image

Joseph Fadler photographs

Joseph Fadler took hundreds of photographs for Sets in Order magazine. This is a selection from the Fadler Collection at the University of Denver. It includes photos of dancing, women's attire, and a… View item