Swing Dancing

Swing dancing dates back to the 1920s and is one of the reasons why that decade will be forever known as the "Roaring '20s." One evening in 1927 following Charles Lindbergh's transatlantic trip to Paris, a man named "Shorty George" Snowden was watching the dancing couples cutting a rug at the Savoy Ballroom in New York City. When a reporter asked him what dance they were doing, a newspaper article about Lindbergh's flight titled "Lindy Hops the Atlantic" caught his eye. George replied, "Lindy Hop" and unwittingly christened one of the earliest swing dances. In the mid 1930s, a bouncy six-beat variant of the Lindy Hop was named the Jitterbug by renowned bandleader Cab Calloway. By the end of that decade, the terms Lindy Hop, Jitterbug, Lindy and Swing were all synonymous for the dance style that was taking over American on the streets, in the nightclubs, at dance contests, in school gymnasiums and on the silver screen.