Re: Origins of Calling

An article by Phil and Vivian Williams, "Lewis and Clark Corps of Discovery Quotes About Fiddling and Dancing" https://www.voyagerrecords.com/arlc.htm collects information about fiddling and dancing done during the Lewis and Clark expedition. The Williamses write: While fiddling and dancing appear many times in the journals, none of the titles of the tunes played are mentioned. The tunes would have been dance tunes extant in 1804 and familiar in the U.S. We also know very little about the dancing that was done. Other than the rather vague account of York’s dancing on January 1, 1805, the only description we have of the dancing comes from the oral history of the Nez Perce Indians. In 1936, Chief Many Wounds (Sam Lott), the great grandson of Red Bear, a Nez Perce chief who helped Lewis and Clark, included stories handed down in his family about Lewis and Clark in his typewritten manuscript Historic Sketches of the Nez Perces: Personal Incidents in the Lives of the Famous Chiefs of the Nez Perce. He said “first time Nez Perces see fiddle one man he play and sing and all others mans dance different kind dance than Indians war dance and negro York he do lots dance with feet and looks funny, all people laugh every body was happy.” And “One white man named Potts ... he boss other mans how to do funny dance and sing songs, and all laugh and Lewis paint faces of Nez Perces with red paint.” This indicates to us that York was step dancing, and that Sergeant Potts was calling a cotillion (an early form of square dance) or a longways set dance. The account doesn't state explicitly whether Potts only "bossed" the others before the music started or whether he actually prompted the figures while the dance was in progress. I lean toward the latter interpretation, but perhaps I'm being biased by my experience of dance calling as currently practiced. --Jim