The Gaskell Ball was a

Victorian Victorian or Victorians may refer to: 19th century * Victorian era, British history during Queen Victoria's 19th-century reign ** Victorian architecture ** Victorian house ** Victorian decorative arts ** Victorian fashion ** Victorian literatur ...

-styled

ball A ball is a round object (usually spherical, but sometimes ovoid) with several uses. It is used in ball games, where the play of the game follows the state of the ball as it is hit, kicked or thrown by players. Balls can also be used for s ...

held by Ye Gaskell Occasional Dance Society in

Oakland, California Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, California, Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major We ...

, United States, popular among historical re-creationists and

vintage dance Vintage dance is the authentic recreation of historical dance styles. Vintage dancing styles include jazz, swing, blues, disco, and breakdancing. Societies Several vintage dance societies hold balls and events to promote and teach vintage dan ...

enthusiasts. The ball began over 40 years ago, as an offshoot of a dance space known as "Mr. Fezziwig's Warehouse" of the Great Dickens Christmas Fair held in

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

. At "Fezziwigs" dozens of people were engaged by the producers to dance with the public all day long. The Gaskell Ball was held at

Oakland Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major West Coast port, Oakland is ...

's Scottish Rite Center on the shore of

Lake Merritt Lake Merritt is a lake located in a large tidal lagoon basin in the center of Oakland, California, just east of Downtown. It is named after Samuel Merritt, Oakland's mayor in 1867–1869, who had the lagoon dammed turning the varying tidal lag ...

every two months through the end of 2014. Due to the increased costs of the hall, the event has become less frequent; only one ball was held in 2015, in October. Music for the event was provided by "Brassworks", a popular local band. The evening included a basic vintage waltz lesson for early attendees and some small potluck refreshments. Dances were taught during a brief course before the ball begins, and include vintage

waltz The waltz ( , meaning "to roll or revolve") is a ballroom dance, ballroom and folk dance, in triple (3/4 time, time), performed primarily in closed position. Along with the ländler and allemande, the waltz was sometimes referred to by the ...

schottische The schottische is a partnered country dance that apparently originated in Bohemia. It was popular in Victorian-era ballrooms as a part of the Bohemian folk-dance craze and left its traces in folk music of countries such as Argentina (Spanish ...

polka Polka is a dance style and genre of dance music in originating in nineteenth-century Bohemia, now part of the Czech Republic. Though generally associated with Czech and Central European culture, polka is popular throughout Europe and the ...

mazurka The Mazurka ( Polish: ''mazurek'') is a Polish musical form based on stylised folk dances in triple meter, usually at a lively tempo, with character defined mostly by the prominent mazur's "strong accents unsystematically placed on the seco ...

, and several

English country dance A country dance is any of a very large number of social dances of a type that originated in England in the British Isles; it is the repeated execution of a predefined sequence of figures, carefully designed to fit a fixed length of music, perfo ...

s. Occasionally, groups will form on the sidelines to dance alternate arrangements to the English Country songs; previous examples include Irish four-hand reels, the

Scottish country dance Scottish country dance (SCD) is the distinctively Scottish form of country dance, itself a form of social dance involving groups of couples of dancers tracing progressive patterns. A dance consists of a sequence of figures. These dances are ...

"Petronella", the Virginia reel, and various

Contra dance Contra dance (also contradance, contra-dance and other variant spellings) is a form of folk dance, folk dancing made up of long lines of couples. It has mixed origins from English country dance, Scottish country dance, and French dance styles in ...

s. Full Victorian dress is not required; the dress code is formal wear of the nineteenth or twentieth centuries. A minimum of semi-formal attire is requested by the ball staff. Although seldom exercised, the staff reserves the right to refuse entrance to those who are inappropriately attired. There are occasional performances by local dance troupes during the intermission, however there is no official dance group affiliated with the ball. The Gaskell Ball is a favorite among dancers from the

Stanford Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth governor of and th ...

UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after the Anglo-Irish philosopher George Berkele ...

and

UC Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of California system. Located in Monterey Bay ...

social dance circles, and is widely credited for popularizing John Hertz's ''

Congress of Vienna Waltz A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of a ...

'' and

Richard Powers Richard Powers (born June 18, 1957) is an American novelist whose works explore the effects of modern science and technology. His novel ''The Echo Maker'' won the 2006 National Book Award for Fiction.Bohemian National Polka Bohemian or Bohemians may refer to: *Anything of or relating to Bohemia Culture and arts * Bohemianism, an unconventional lifestyle, originally practised by 19th–20th century European and American artists and writers. * Bohemian style, a f ...

'' choreographies. The last ball was held on Saturday, October 24, 2015. After that the ball went on hiatus for nine years. In 2024, a new ball was scheduled, and will be held on December 28th, 2024.

History

The Gaskell Ball is named for the British writer

Elizabeth Gaskell Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell (''née'' Stevenson; 29 September 1810 – 12 November 1865), often referred to as Mrs Gaskell, was an English novelist, biographer, and short story writer. Her novels offer detailed studies of Victorian era, Victoria ...

. The Gaskell Ball originated in 1979, when the troupe playing the Gaskell family at The Great Dickens Christmas Fair decided to hold a ball in her honor. The first official ball was held at

Mills College Mills College at Northeastern University in Oakland, California is part of Northeastern University's global university system. Mills College was founded as the Young Ladies Seminary in 1852 in Benicia, California; it was relocated to Oakland in ...

, a women's college in Oakland. Unofficially, it germinates from a 19th century dance party held in 1976 at Mills College because the Dickens Fair didn't happen that year. A Mills College student who had danced at Fezziwigs at the Dickens Fair's Army Street location in 1974 and 1975, hosted the event because with no month-long Fair, she and her friends were "going into dance withdrawal." These students and others would go on to continue working at the Dickens Fair wher
Carol Teten
(Teton) was engaged to teach for the 1977, 1978 and 1979 seasons. Following Mills College, Gaskell Ball moved to the Veterans' Auditorium on Lake Merritt in Oakland. In the 1990s the Ball outgrew the hall and was moved to accommodate the increased attendance at the Scottish Rite Center on the other side of Lake Merritt.

History

References

External links