The popularity of the Y-Co Dances was contagious and unforgettable.
It’s time for the fifth
annual Remembering
Y-Co 1950s & ’60s Dance
By Angela Magee
T
he Glenwood YMCA is hosting its fifth annual Remember
Y-Co 1950s & ’60s Dance on Oct. 8, from 8 to 11 p.m. at
Rainbow Gardens.
The original Y-Co dances, short for Y-Coed, were held on Saturday
nights for high school students in 10th
to 12th grade from 1960 to 1968. The
popular event became one of the most
prestigious dances in Erie.
Admission was only 50 cents at the
time, but you had to be a member or
guest. Each school was allotted a certain
number of members and often there was a
waiting list.
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“Becoming a Y-Co member was prestigious and not easy. First,
you had to be nominated by a member, then approved by your
school’s representatives. Then nominees had to wait for an opening
for your gender in your school,” writer Chuck Pora explains.
Pora, a local author and lifelong Erie resident, features the history
of the Y-Co dances in his nostalgic book, “Why We Never Had
Dates.” The memoir recounts Pora’s adventures as a young man
growing up in Erie in the 1960s.
Pora, who now helps organize the reunion Y-Co dances for the
YMCA at Rainbow Gardens, tries to recreate an exact replica of the
old dances including hula-hoop, limbo, and dance contests.
Young men and women would attend in hopes of finding that
special someone under the watchful eye of the chaperones who
were there to enforce the strict dress code and make sure the
youngsters weren’t getting too close during a slow song.
“I have one outfit I kept that I can still fit into. It’s my old high
school letter sweater, baggy pants and skinny tie, and a crazy hat,”
Pora admits. “It’s fun to see the ‘old fogies’ trying to dance all
dressed up in our old clothes.”
Have you heard a song on the radio and been transported back
in time with a flood of emotions and triggered memories? For the