Bob Brundage – Well, Hi again. This is Bob Brundage and the date today is December the 6^th, 2005. Today I’m having the pleasure of talking with a young lady up in Massachusetts who has been very, very busy in the dance field – Veronica McClure. So, Veronica why don’t you start out by telling us where you were born and brought up and we’ll kind of take it from there.

Veronica McClure – I was born in Baltimore and I was there until two years after college. I wasn’t aware of square dancing until late in the game. That’s where it started because I joined up with a bunch of college students from John Hopkins and Goucher College in Baltimore, Maryland. They were known as the Gouchkin Hoppers which was reversing the syllables of Hopkins and Goucher and drew folks from several other schools as well. I got involved with that because, for some reason at school there was a big event with a lot of different people from different places and there was an easy level square dance because everybody could join in on that. I thought that was cool – I had a great time. Somebody told me about the college groups because of my interest from that chance encounter with squares.

BB – OK

VM – Starting – I was a horse crazy youngster, although I never owned a horse I had found ways to get active with horses and I think, when I got interested in rounds I was transferring a lot of the idea of movement from two beings, horse and rider to two beings, person and person …. laughs

BB – Yes.

VM - …. and so – and I stumbled in college – we had required Phys Ed credits to make up. I really didn’t want to do much in the real sports but there were two dance classes, which I took and I enjoyed a whole lot. When I got more and more involved with the Gouchkin Hoppers – and they had rounds as well – I started doing that too. The first time I met anybody from the Gouchkin Hoppers was a fellow named Frank Kujawa who I think was a professor in the Florida State University. He was trying to get just a square of anybody together because he wanted to work out Teacup Chain, which he had just learned about. The first thing I did was help out with this guinea pig square for Frank to figure out Teacup Chain so It was the only thing I knew.   Both laugh.  So he said, “ Oh, we’re dancing this Sunday you know. Come on over, come on over.” So, I went over, walked in and they were just beginning to square up and they needed one more person. The first thing out of the caller’s mouth was Teacup Chain so I sailed through it and I didn’t know a single thing after that. Nobody could understand why I would know Teacup Chain and nothing else. They kept thinking I was spoofing them or something.  Eventually, Frank showed up and corroborated my story. Both laugh. But it was a strange introduction to a group.

BB – OK. Well then, when did you pick up with Don Beck?

VM – Oh, that was after Boston. I moved to Boston on December first, '67. Earlier in the fall, September or October, another woman who had been dancing with the Gouchkin Hoppers came to Boston. She had been at John Hopkins as a graduate student and was coming to Boston to do a ??, I think at MIT. That was earlier in the fall of 1967 and she saw a note or met somebody who knew that there were a small group of folks getting together who were all members of the Outing Club. The Outing Club had occasional Eastern or Traditional style square dances but there were some folks in the Outing Club who were comfortable with those dances who had heard of western style and were curious and wanted to try it out. Don wanted to try to learn to call it. So, the kids formal subset of Outing Club folks got together so that Don would have a group. That was the beginning of Don�