Hilda and Emily Demuth signing copies of Plank Road Winter
Back in the 1970s when Emily and I attended Yorkville 4-H meetings in the old schoolhouse we knew as the Clover Center, we never dreamed that someday we’d be signing books in that very building.
On a glorious Sunday afternoon in September our families and friends and neighbors gathered for the Plank Road Winter launch party.
Dancing at the Plank Road Winter launch party in the Yorkville 4-H Clover Center
The doorway into that 1886 schoolroom was a portal to the past as the musicians played old tunes and the dancers circled and stomped on the sturdy wood floor.
John and Susan Nicholson of Frogwater
Some of those in attendance wore period attire, and these visitors from the nineteenth century mingled easily with our twenty-first century guests.
Our caller, Patricia Lynch of the West Side Soldiers’ Aid Society, taught the figures of each dance. Members of her Victorian Dancers group ably helped beginners of all ages and also demonstrated several Civil War dances.
Nineteenth century and twenty-first century guests mingling on the dance floor at the 1886 Yorkville schoolhouse
Around three o’clock when the Packer game was about to start, which meant that nobody was in line to have a book signed, Emily and I were able to take a few turns on the dance floor ourselves.
Many thanks to everyone who attended the launch and to all who share our delight in preserving traditions such as old-time dancing, especially in places like that beautiful little Yorkville schoolhouse.
Plank Road Stories 