There will be dancing in the streets of Elmore City this weekend as the town hosts its annual Footloose Festival Saturday. There will be a variety of dance contests, plenty of street vendors, a car show, lawnmower races and an evening street dance.
The annual festival is a great time for people from all over to come together and celebrate dancing of all types. But for some in the community, it’s also a time to commemorate the Elmore City junior-senior prom of 1980 and the small victory students won that year – the chance to have a public dance.
“I’m sure there’s a younger generation that knows nothing about that prom, and for them it’s just a festival. But for a group of us who were the students, it’s about commemorating that prom,” said Lisa Rollings, who was a sophomore at Elmore City High School in 1980.
Just in case you haven’t heard the story, in the early ‘80s public dancing was still prohibited in Elmore City by an ordinance that had been on the books for nearly a hundred years.
As the junior class of 1980 began planning the annual junior-senior banquet that year, they decided they wanted to have a dance, too.
“Really, I think we were just the first to question it, to ask, ‘Why can’t we dance?’” Rollings said.
A few local church leaders and others in the community were against the idea, sure that mayhem would ensue if young people were allowed to dance. Others insisted allowing the dance at the school would keep students safer than if they participated in off-campus activities after the banquet.
The mayor at the time, who happened to be Rollings’ father, took the position that the prom was not a public event but a private school event. That left the decision of whether to dance or not up to the school board, who eventually voted 3 to 2 to allow the dance.
The sophomore class served at the banquet that year, Rollings said, and they were allowed to stay afterward for the dance.
Elmore City’s first prom with dancing was big news in 1980, and news media from all over showed up to cover it. The dance was held in the elementary school cafeteria, which had limited space for dancing, and the dance floor was even smaller once all the reporters and cameras were packed in, Rollings said.
The story, of course, inspired the 1984 movie “Footloose,” as well as a re-boot by the same name released in 2011. While the movies included quite a bit of Hollywood embellishment, Rollings said the basic premise of the students campaigning for the chance to dance at prom was pretty accurate.
Though the ordinance that caused all the ruckus was officially taken off the books a few years later, Rollings said the community didn’t come together to truly dance in a public space until the first Footloose Festival was held in 2010.
That first festival was organized as a nod to the 30th anniversary of the original “Footloose prom” by community members and town officials, including Rollings, who had been there.
“It was the saddest little festival that first year. It was rainy part of the day and misty and overcast,” Rollings said. “But we had the best time! We had an indoor dance that year because of the weather, and we were like, ‘Man, look how far we’ve come.’”
This year’s festival will kick off with the Athletic Boosters Pancake Breakfast at 7 a.m. at the Elmore City Community Center, 104 S. Main Street.
Car Show registration starts at 8 a.m. on South Main Street, with car show judging beginning at 10 a.m.
Vendors and inflatables open for business at 9 a.m., and local musicians Myra & Company will be playing on the Main Street stage from 8:30-10 a.m.
The Main Street stage will feature the Festival Queen and Princess coronation at 10 a.m., followed by a variety of dance contests from 10:15-11:15 a.m. and 12:30- 1:30 p.m. The Elmore City Citizen of the Year and scholarship presentations will also take place there at 11:30 a.m.
Lawnmower race registration is at 3:30, with races set to begin on South Main Street at 4 p.m.
Festivities will wrap up with the Footloose Street Dance from 6-10 p.m. at the Main Street stage area. For a complete schedule of events, visit “Footloose Fest” on Facebook.
