The picture you see here is an elegant ball that took place every year in Burlington North Carolina. What you are seeing here also is an event that took place in a building that is part of a school that was a segregated high school in which still stands to this day. It was an all black high school named Jordan Sellars High School located in the neighborhood I grew up in.
Why am I talk about this?
Simpy because it has a very rich history.....this school has a very fascinating history that I will definitely be posting about in the next few days.
What I want to share with you is an event I attended every year called The Shamrock Ball. It was a ball that brought two schools together that were arch rivals in sports, mainly in football.
Now to give you some since of the fierce rivalry between Cummings and Williams High School, just think of the Carolina Tarheels and Duke Blue Devils rivalry.
Young men and women of the two schools would get all dressed up in tuxedos and fancy white gowns to showcase their academic achievements in class. They would be teamed up with a partner from the other school.
The ladies would be the focus of the night, very much like a pageant. They would be asked questions, talk about their plans after high school, and afterwards it would be a dance off. The dance off was my favorite, you see it would always start off as a waltz style of dance that would morph into a very fascinating Soul Train like dance. At the end of the dance one lady would be awarded a scholarship for college and a lot of other gifts
Here are some pictures
The above picture is the itinerary book that shows you the ladies and gentlemens that will be paired up with....the young lady top left was my neighbor in which she won that year, that was 1989. The ball no longer happens now, my kids don't know anything much about it other than what I have told about it and it's glorious show.
It was fun, it was us and it was ours!