This message is kinda long, so here's the executive summary: Can any of you identify sources that describe wrist-hold stars in American square or contra dancing before 1949? I'd be particularly interested in sources that date from significantly earlier and in sources that describe wrist-holds as being a new or newly-popular style in some area. Now the longer version: Over on the SharedWeight callers' forum, the topic came up lately (starting Oct. 10 with a message from John Sweeney for those who want to checkthe archives) of wrist-hold stars vs. hands-across or other styles and which style is predominant among contra dancers in different parts of the country. From the responses, it appears that the wrist hold is currently the usual styling (among contra dancers) in most areas except for parts of the southeast, and except when there's something particular about the choreography that makes hand-across preferable (e.g., two couples star with hands across, then men drop out while women keep turning by their joined hands). On Oct 11, 2016, at 1:14 PM, Dan Pearl quoted a posting by Sylvia Miskoe to rec.folk-dancing on March 4, 1999 in which she wrote: [Sylvia, if you're reading this, can you say when this happened? According to the NEFFA history at http://www.neffa.org/history.html the Lithuanian dancers have been regular performers since the very first Festival in the fall of 1944. Are you talking about that first appearance or a later one? Also, was it your impression that that was how the wrist-hold star first got introduced to square (and/or contra) dancers in your area? Or do you think it merely helped popularize a style some dancers were already using?] I think it would be quite noteworthy if the appearance of the Lithuanian Dance group at NEFFA could clearly be identified as *the* point from which wrist-hold stars spread to become common throughout most of the U.S. Assuming the Lithuanian dancers indeed set off a local surge in popularity of wrist-hold stars among square and/or contra dancers, there may nonetheless have been other times and places where wrist-hold stars were either imported into American dance forms from some other tradition or independently discovered by American dancers. However, I can't offer much evidence on the subject one way or the other. I'd be interested in any other info on the introduction or use of wrist-hold stars from before about 1950, either from dancers with long memories, from written records, or from photos or drawings. Even an opinion piece disparaging wrist stars as uncomfortable or as inauthentic for some region would be evidence that some dancers were using them at the time of writing. Taking a quick look through some of the sources I have at hand, I'm surprised to see that the earliest mentions or descriptions of wrist-hold stars that I've found so far date from 1949. I hasten to emphasize that I've examined only a relatively small number of sources, and those only cursorily. Possibly some of you can find earlier mentions of wrist-hold stars. If so, please tell me about them Here's summary of what I've found in the sources I've checked so far. I'll start with the definite mentions, descriptions, or illustrations or wrist-hold stars, including the earliest ones I've found and a selection of later ones. Then I'll go on to list a few where the descriptions either definitely indicate a different styling or don't give enough detail to make it clear just what styling is intended. ========== 1949 Ed Gilmore Square Dance Callers Instruction Course Linked from http://squaredancehistory.org/items/show/581 In the notes on "Texas Star", Ed writes: Do not teach wrist hold star to beginners at the first two or three dances. ... To me this indicates that he does recommend teaching wrist hold stars eventually. ========== 1949 Sets In Order, Vol 1, No. 6, June, 1949 A description of the dance "Four Gents Star" on page 7 reads, in part: Four gents star in the center of the square. The four men make a right hand star taking the wrist of the gent ahead of them. I own a copy of the complete digitized _Sets In Order_. This is the earliest occurrence of the word "wrist" found by a full text search. (Note, however, that the magazine only commenced publication in November 1948). ========== 1949 "On Standardization of Fundamentals" Sets In Order, Vol 1, No. 9, September, 1949 Pages 8-9 This article, reporting on a meeting of about 100 callers from Los Angeles and surrounding counties offers the following styling suggestions for stars: STARS—Gents, wrist hold recommended. Ladies, hand hold recommended (because of skirt work). This is to be formed by each person putting arm out at about shoulder height with palm of hand toward opposite person. Mixed, hand hold recommended. Star with crossed hands—Just that, take hand of person across from you. ========== 1950 Guy Merrill Merrill's Standardization of Square Dancing American Squares, Vol. 5, No. 7, March, 1950 Pages 11-12. This tongue-in-cheek list of styling recommendations includes the following (on p. 11): 27. Wrist hold in star formations—At call "Gents to the center and form right hand star", always stop still in center of set, discuss wrist hold, teach newcomers how to do it. Everyone will enjoy this. When that chap gets your wrist he'll hurt it so don't let him get it. _American Squares_ began publication in September, 1945. This is the second-earliest occurrence of "wrist" found by full-text search. The one earlier occurrence has nothing to do with stars. ========== 1950 Richard Kraus Square Dances of Today and How to Teach and Call Them The description of the figure "STAR" on page 11 says: ... The hands may rest in the center, one on top of another, or they may each grasp the wrist of the person in front of the dancer. The star is sometimes called a _mill_. The accompanying drawing shows four boys making in a wrist-hold star. A diagram on page 86, illustrating the dance "Skating Away", shows a mixed-sex group of four dancers in a star with each one holding the wrist of the dancer *behind* them. I believe this is an artist's error. ========== 1950 Jane Harris, Anne Pittman, and Marlys Swenson [now Marlys Waller] Dance A While, 1st edition [My copy of the 1st edition is a 1951 third printing.] On page 29, near the biginning of the chapter on Western Square Dancing, the authors give a list of regional differences dancers might encounter, including 7. hand or wrist grasps on star figures ========== 1950 Lee Owens and Viola Ruth Advanced Square Dance Figures of the West and Southwest The description of the chorus figure "Eight Hand Kentucky Star" on page 55 reads, in part: ..., all [eight --js] step toward the center and form a Left-Hand Kentucky Star by grasping with the left hand the wrist of the person ahead of each in the formation, ... On page 80, the description for the chorus figure "The Big Wheel" reads, in part: The ladies now dance forward to form a Right-Hand Kentucky Star by each grasping the right wrist of the lady ahead of her by the right hand. ... The ladies extend their Star by _changing from a wrist grasp_ with the lady ahead to an _elbow grasp with the same lady_, the ladies taking one step outward to form this extended Star. This book and its predecessor, _American Square Dances of the West and Southwest_ (by Lee Owens, with music arranged by Viola Ruth, 1949) also contain many dances with four-person stars for which a wrist grasp is *not* specified. I find it odd that Owens refers to the wrist-hold star as a "Kentucky Star", since I know of no evidence for that styling being traditional in Kentucky in the early-to-mid 20th century. ========== 1954 Lee Owens Grass Roots and Fancy Cuttings American Squares, Vol. 9, No. 11, July, 1954 Pages 4-5,19 In this article, Owens again uses the term "Kentucky Star" for a wrist-hold star, and he recommends this styling for stars made by more than two couples. In fact, he writes: It is a physical impossibility to join more than two pairs of hands--a four-hand formation--in a star figure; however, there are many eight-hand star figures in the square dance. This situation is easily handled by using the so-called "Kentucky Star" (designed for use with any number of dancers) in such figures by each dancer grasping the wrist of the person ahead of him in the formation. In the Kentucky Star, the arms are held at the same angle as in a four-hand star, and wrists are grasped at shoulder height. Any number of dancers can form a star which has a perfect hub without crowding or "reaching" by using this wrist-hold, which is unnecessary in a four-hand star. I don't have much experience with eight-person stars, but I have ample experience to say that forming a six-person star with hands-across styling is easy. Also, I doubt that a circle of, say, 20 couples could comfortably form a giant "star" with each dancer holding the wrist of the dancer ahead, though they probably could do it by holding the *shoulder* (or perhaps even the elbow) of the dancer ahead. ========== 1957 Gene Gowing Square Dancing for Everyone The caption of a photograph on page 14 describes a hands-across star. RIGHT-HAND STAR ... You gentlemen just grab right hands, and you ladies take right hands over the men's. ... The photograph, however, clearly shows a wrist-hold star. This suggest that what someone writes in a book *might* not match the contemporaneous styling even in the author's own locality. ========== 1957 Gene Gowing Square Dancer's Guide [The copyright page bears no date, but with the aid of Google's Advanced Book Search, I found a catalog of copyright entries that lists the publication date as 10 May 1957. The same catalog list a January publication date for _Square Dancing for Everyone_.] The definition of "Right-and-left-hand-star" on pages 23-24 first describes hands-across styling, then offers the wrist-hold (or "basket hold") as a variation. ========== 1957 "Square Dancing Old Country Style" (first installment) American Square, Vol. 13, No. 3, November, 1957 Pages 14-15, 28 The description (by Olga Kilbitsky) of a German quadrille called "Puttjenter" (Put-yen-ter) reads in part (p. 28): Music A III--Boys' Mill Boys join right hands across the center, grasping the wrist ahead. 1- 4 BOYS circle clockwise in RIGHT-HAND Mill with eight walking steps, 5- 8 BOYS circle counterclockwise in LEFT-HAND Mill with eight walking steps. [Note: The text above is nicely formatted when I look at it in a fixed-width font. If you view it in a variable-width font and/or some bit of software on the path from me to you "helpfully" removes "extraneous" spaces, then it might look ugly to you, but I think it should still be intelligible. --js] So we see that the Lithuanians aren't the only nationality whose ethnic dance traditions include wrist-hold stars. In any area where a fair number of square (and/or contra) dancers were also involved in international folk dancing, it could have been easy for the wrist-hold star styling to have jumped into American dancing from some European tradition. The case for that actually having happened would be more compelling if we could find other contemporary or eyewitness accounts besides Sylvia's intriguing recollections. ========== c. 1965 David Hoffman Video (transferred from film) of a dance called by Dudley Laufman https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZubTju7g_s As John Sweeney pointed out, this video from New England in the mid 1960s shows wrist-hold stars. There's some uncertainty about the date. In different comments David Hoffman gives it as 1964 and 1965. A comment by Jeffrey Simonson claims the video shows people who started dancing in May, 1966. A comment by Trina Royar identifies the location as Richmond, New Hampshire (not Vermont as stated elsewhere). At 1:42 we can see a young Sylvia Miskoe playing accordion. ========== 1982 Ted Sannella [Note correct spelling, with 2 "n"s and 2 "l"s.] Balance and Swing The glossary entry for "STAR" (p. 146) reads, in part: ... In New England, the customary way to link up in a star is to extend arms near chest height, elbows slightly bent, hands out with palms down, and grasp the wrist of the dancer ahead. ========== 2004 Larry Jennings Give-and-Take On page 43, in a section titled "Effective Lingo", Larry mentions some of his personal conventions about terminology, including o Use "star" for a wrist grasp; "hands across" for hands across even though many callers consciously use "star" for either. ====================================================================== And now here are jut a few examples of sources in which I did *not* find descriptions or illustrations of wrist-hold stars. In some case the authors clearly recommend a different styling; in others the descriptions are to vague (or the illustrations are insufficiently detailed) to make it clear just what styling is intended. Since I didn't pore over these sources page-by-page and line-by-line, and since I generally don't have them in full-text-searchable form, it's possible that some may mention wrist-hold stars in passages that I failed to examine (and which I would be pleased to have any of you point out). ========== 1918 Elizabeth Burchenal, ed. American Country-Dances, Volume I: Twenty-Eight Contra-Dances Largely from the New England States On page xvi, the figure "Right-Hand Mill" is described as follows: Four dancers join hands (as indicted in Diagram 11), and move around in the direction of the hands of the clock. In the diagram, the dancers arms are represented by a simple pair of crossing lines, like the letter "X", with no detail shown of what happens in the center. ========== 1926 "Good Morning": After a Sleep of Twenty-five Years, Old-Fashioned Dancing is Being Revived by Mr. and Mrs. Henry Ford This dance descriptions in this book were written by Benjamin Lovett, a dancing master that Henry Ford met in Massachusetts and brought to Michigan. Definitions of "Cross Right Hands" and "Cross Right Hands Half Around" on page 23 say nothing about wrists. On page 27, we find MOULINET--A wheel formation. Four ladies or gentlemen join right hands across, ... Mention of wrist-hold stars is similarly absent--as far as I have noticed--from the fourth edition, published in 1943. In that edition, an illustration of "Four ladies grand chain" on page 123 shows hands-across styling. ========== 1937 Beth Tolman and Ralph Page The Country Dance Book If wrist-hold stars were traditional in New England in the early 20th century, we might expect to find mention of them here. Nope. On page 35 we find CROSS RIGHT HANDS HALF AROUND: (4 [measures --js]) Four ladies of gents, as the prompter may direct, give right hands to the opposite, walk in a half circle to the left and then stop. LEFT HANDS BACK: (4) From the above position, they turn, cross left hands with the opposite, and walk back to place. An illustration of "Ladies Grand Chain" found on page 6 and again on page 137 shows what looks like hands-across styling or might just possibly be interpreted as "lump" styling but definitely is not wrist-hold styling. While this offers no evidence *for* wrist-hold stars being done in New England in the 1930s, it's hardly conclusive evidence *against* it. I'll point out that (1) there may have been different local stylings in different New England communities, (2) definitions in dance books are sometimes adapted (or even copied verbatim) from older sources without necessarily being brought up to date with current practice, and (3) illustrations are not always trustworthy. Apropos that last point, an illustration on page 33 of _The Country Dance Book_ depicts "Allemande Left" as an elbow swing, but the text describes it as hand turn, and an illustration of "Swing Contry Corners" on page 105 shows dancers turning corners by right hands while the definition of that figure (on page 41) says they turn by left hands. ========== 1949 Ed Durlacher Honor Your Partner Starting on page 175, Durlacher presents sequences of small photographs illustrating a number of different square dance moves. He writes ... They can be studied in two ways -- by flipping the entire sequence to achieve a moving picture effect, and by studying each individual frame and the instructions that go with it. ... One of the sequences is titled STAR BY THE RIGHT BACK BY THE LEFT The accompanying instructions read (one line per leaf) First Couple walk to Couple Two joining right hands in the center They walk around once to the left If the hands are held shoulder high the two Couples take only the allotted space necessary to do the figure Drop hands turn and join left hands and walk back to the right to the starting position This figure is also called The Mill Moulinet Right Hands Crossed and Left Hand Back The photos are small and not crisp, and it's hard to see any detail of the handholds, but they don't seem to be showing wrist holds has far as I can see. ====================================================================== I'll add that while Owens (see above) refers to a wrist-hold star as a "Kentucky Star", I have found no mention of such a hold in any of the following books: The Country Dance Book, Part V (by Cecil J. Sharp, 1917) [describing dances collected by Sharp in Kentucky] Square Dances of America (by Douglas and Helen Kennedy, c. 1930?) The Appalachian Square Dance (by Frank H. Smith, 1955) Kentucky Mountain Square Dancing (by Patrick E. Napier, 1960) [My copy is a 7th printing, dated 1999] At least some of these do mention figures where dancers move in a single-file circle with each dancer having a hand on the *shoulder* of the dancer ahead. The Kennedys' book uses the term "Mill Wheel" for that figure. I could name various other sources that *don't* describe wrist-hold stars. Instead, I'll stop and wait to see whether any of you can name early sources that *do.* Thanks. --Jim