Jim Mayo: We’re starting an interview here with ROUNDALAB’S Silver Halo winners this year, Ralph & Joan Collipi from Salem New Hampshire and, because I live ten miles down the street in Hampstead NH I have been asked to conduct the interview with them as part of the oral history project that Bob Brundage has been carrying out for the Lloyd Shaw Foundation.  Ralph & Joan, first of all let me congratulate you on being selected for this honor.  Can you tell me what the Silver Halo is and how it came to you? 

Ralph Collipi: Well Jim, the Silver Halo is ROUNDALAB’S second highest award.  And understand if you go back and read the criteria for someone to be recommended for Silver Halo I think the main thrust in there is that the person you are recommending should have contributed greatly to the round dance program.  As to how it came to us, we have no idea.  It was a complete and utter surprise. 

Jim: Did they tell you who recommended you or does it just come? 

Ralph:   Yes, they told us who put in the recommendations and, ah, beyond that we have no idea who the committee is that makes the decision because 

Jim: Oh, it isn’t your Board of Governors or ...

Ralph: No it isn’t.  It’s a secret committee and its chaired by a gentlemen by the name of Dick Buman? Out in Mesa Arizona and he has three members

Joan Collipi: No, he has twelve –

Ralph Oh, I’m sorry, he has twelve teacher couple members that review all the material that is sent in and they are sent bio’s on the people that are recommended.  They review them all and then they make the decision whether or not to ...

Joan: It has to be 100% approval. 

Jim: It has to be 100% so anybody that wants to blackball you can.  

Joan: Yeah, this is true.  The answer would be no.

Jim: The CALLERLAB Milestone award is awarded by the Executive Committee.  That’s pretty obvious that it changes with each election. 

Joan: The only person that knows ... The committee changes every couple of years except the chairman doesn’t change but the only person who knows who’s on this committee is the chairman of ROUNDALAB that year providing they want to know. 

Ralph: And the chairman of the committee ...

 Joan: And the chairman of the committee, of course he has to choose his committee members, but basically that’s it.

 Jim: So essentially it’s a secret process. 

Joan: Very secret. 

Jim: Well, it clearly is an honor and we’re pleased that it came to you.  My own personal association with you says you surely deserved it.   

Ralph: Thank you.

Jim: I’d like to start with you, at Bob’s request and cover sort of how you got to where round dancing began.  Uh, where’d you come from and what did you do before you got into round dancing? 

Ralph: Well, we had a family.  At that time our kids were kinda young at the time and we started square dancing in 1968. 

Jim: Have you always lived in this area? 

Ralph: Yes we have.  We’ve lived in Salem now for forty years.  But a couple whom we knew from PTA came and dragged Joan out of the house one night to go square dancing while I was working overtime.  She called me and asked me to pick her up at the school.  I said why and she said never mind just come.  And the next thing you know we were square dancing.

Jim: You both worked for ...  

Ralph: We both worked for AT&T.  

Jim: At Western Electric?  

Ralph: Originally at Western Electric and then when it became AT&T we worked for AT&T and we retired before it became Lucent or whatever it is today. 

Jim: Did you work for somebody before them?  Did you go to Salem High School?  

Ralph: I went to Dracut High School in Massachusetts and Joan went to Lawrence High School in Massachusetts. 

Joan: I graduated 1950 and Ralph graduated in 1949.  He had 32 people in his class. 

Ralph: I don’t think that’s necessary information. 

Joan: I had 433 in my class.

Jim: Did you do any dancing in school? 

Joan: I was an avid dancer.  I went to all the big bands.  I think I’ve seen them all.  Tommy Dorsey, Jimmy Dorsey, Glen Miller, uh ...

 Jim: So ballroom style dancing is not a new experience.  

Joan: Oh, that’s always been my ....

Ralph: I think when we were dating we were dancing four nights a week, ballroom style dancing. 

Jim: and you still are. 

Ralph & Joan: and we still are, right.

Jim: Interesting.  Did you get into the military at all? 

Ralph: I was in the Army as a machine gunner for two years and I spent eighteen months of that two years in Korea. 

Jim: You hit that war too, eh? 

Ralph: Yes I did.  It was supposed to be a police action. 

Joan: But you weren’t a machine gunner. 

Ralph: Yes I was.  Well, I started out that way but I became Company Clerk.

 Joan: There you go. 

Jim: You could type. 

Ralph: I could type.  And because I could type I got a medal.  They call it a green weenie.  It was a commendation for meritorious service.  I never knew why they gave it to me.

 Jim: That’s how I got to not go to Korea.  Because I could type.  And so you finally got enough free time to get dragged off to square dance class and how did that hit you? 

Ralph: Well, the first night I walked in Joan had already been there for a while.  And the next thing you know I’m in there holding hands with a bunch of people going around in a circle and I said to myself “This is insane.  I don’t know why I’m here.”  Within eight weeks of that day Joan says to me “I don’t feel that good.   I don’t think I’m going to go to class tonight.”  I said “Fine, there’s plenty of women there.  I’ll see you when I get home.”  And the next thing you know we were hooked. 

Jim: I see, isn’t it amazing how that happens. 

Joan: The club that we were going into which was the Track Town Trotters in Salem, NH had, uh, barely two squares.  In our class of beginners Stan Kandrut was our caller, we had fifteen squares.

 Jim: In your class. 

Joan: In our class. 

Jim: This was’68. 

Joan: Yes  

 Ralph: ‘68, ‘69    

Joan: So naturally this became the club.  So Ralph and I, when we graduated that year we became the following year’s class chairman and another fifteen squares.  That’s - we worked hard. That summer, very hard.  ‘Cause you don’t - that doesn’t just happen. 

Jim: Even in 1968 that doesn’t just happen. 

Joan: Even in 1968 it didn’t just happen.  We worked very hard at doing that.  But it was like running a dance every week with fifteen squares.  It was not an easy task.  But it was a lot of fun.  It was very enjoyable.