There’s a saying about square dancing that calls it “friendship put to music.” 

For members of a 70-year-old local square dancing club, it seems to sum up the heart of the social dance.

Members of the Prairie Shufflers club have found their community through the dances and classes hosted by the club and throughout the state and country.

Several members even met their spouses through square dancing. “It’s a great dating app, apparently,” joked Diana Gregory, 69, of Benton City. 

It’s a community that’s been around since 1956, and they’ve danced in their hall at 717 N. Irving St., Kennewick – known as the Shuffler’s Shanty – since 1969, when it was built specifically for the club.

The group was once one of as many as seven different square dance clubs in the Tri-Cities, but now there’s only one left. Many in the region shuttered during the Covid-19 pandemic. The Kennewick-based Shufflers managed to keep dancing after restrictions were lifted and is still going strong today, hosting classes twice a year and dances at least twice a month. 

About 70 people are club members, though not all are active.

Square and round dancing

Square dancing follows a series of calls, making it hard to pick up on the spot. That’s why the Prairie Shufflers offer 15-week-long classes every spring and fall for beginners. 

The classes are focused on two different levels of square dancing: mainstream and plus. Both have a standardized set of 50 moves learned throughout the course and can be danced throughout the country – and even internationally. 

In square dancing, four couples gather in a square, and there are typically three to five squares during a dance. 

A caller tells dancers what to do: first in a spoken call, or a patter, then in a singing call. The two together are called a tip, and after a tip, there is a break for couples to do round dancing. That’s a different type of dance that the Prairie Shufflers teach classes on. It’s similar to ballroom dancing, but has cues spoken aloud to determine each move.

Prairie Shufflers recently started its spring classes, with square dancing classes on Sunday and Monday evenings, and round dancing classes on Tuesday evenings. The series of classes costs $75 and participants get free membership for a year. A second round of classes will be held in the fall.

Membership is $50, and dances, held on the first and third Fridays of the month and sometimes more often, have a $10 suggested donation for both members and nonmembers. 

Dances typically run from 6:30-10 p.m., with opportunities for round dancing, mainstream square dancing and plus square dancing. 

Dancers can wear traditional skirts and petticoats if they want, but it’s not required. There’s also a closet of donated square-dancing attire to peruse.

When they aren’t dancing in it, the Prairie Shufflers rent out their hall to help cover the cost of snacks and bringing in callers.  

Dancing community

A set of standard square dance moves means that those who’ve taken lessons with the Prairie Shufflers can also travel to Germany or Japan and square dance at the same level there, said club president Kevin Rucker, 68, of Burbank.

While club members don’t necessarily go abroad, there are many who travel throughout the state to attend dances, sometimes on a national level. 

That’s how Rucker met his wife. He was standing on a planter at a national square dance convention in Seattle, looking for his dance partner among the 22,000 other participants, when his future wife tugged on his pants to ask if he needed a dance partner. 

Jim Swanson, 63, of Pine City, met his late wife at a state festival in 1983 in Spokane. 

Others have made friends throughout the state and country while traveling to various dances, and the Prairie Shufflers have formed their own community bonds as well. “It becomes a family,” Swanson said.

He said that the club is a safe space, a family-friendly activity, with no alcohol or drugs, and young and old alike are welcome.

For the seniors involved in Prairie Shufflers, the club helps meet their needs through socialization, exercise and learning new things, said Suzanne Benfield, 69, of Kennewick, the club’s secretary. Lots of the club members are around retirement age. 

Some of the Prairie Shufflers have seen those far older than them dancing. Gregory said she was at a dance in Spokane and met a 90-year-old woman who “could dance with the best of them.”

And Swanson danced with a 101-year-old man in Portland. 

There are younger dancers, too. Rucker said their youngest dancer is a teenager. One of the group’s goals is to bring in more families so that as members of the club age out, there will be new dancers coming in.

Having fun

Once dancers graduate from the Prairie Shufflers’ beginners classes, they’re asked to be “angels” for new dancers in the next round of classes, or mentors, Swanson said. More experienced dancers help out, too. 

Rucker said that callers will watch what’s going on to see if squares are having difficulties and make changes as needed. 

“There’s a whole bell curve of people that just got through lessons to someone who has been dancing for 50 years, right? So, you’ve got to mix it up, so everybody has fun at the dance,” he said. 

“The fun thing is, everybody gets to make mistakes. You just got to figure out how to figure out how to get out of it and keep moving,” Rucker said. “No matter how good you are.”

“The object is recovering, not perfection,” Swanson said. “And if at the end of the tip, we still have smiles on the faces, we have succeeded.”

Go to: prairieshufflers.com.