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Cheer Dance

The origins of cheer dance can be traced back to American cheerleading in the 19th century which started as all-male pep clubs supporting football teams. Cheerleading incorporated dance, acrobatics, and pom poms over time. Lawrence Herkimer is considered the "grandfather of cheerleading" for founding the National Cheerleading Association and standardizing practices in the 1940s-50s. Today, cheer dance has evolved into a competitive sport and art form combining dance, gymnastics, and school spirit.

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738 views15 pages

Cheer Dance

The origins of cheer dance can be traced back to American cheerleading in the 19th century which started as all-male pep clubs supporting football teams. Cheerleading incorporated dance, acrobatics, and pom poms over time. Lawrence Herkimer is considered the "grandfather of cheerleading" for founding the National Cheerleading Association and standardizing practices in the 1940s-50s. Today, cheer dance has evolved into a competitive sport and art form combining dance, gymnastics, and school spirit.

Uploaded by

Elizabeth
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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CHEER

DANCE
HISTORY OF CHEER DANCE

The origins of cheer dance are definitely to be


found in American cheerleading, which goes back to
the 19th century and as originally all-male, until
women were allowed to come in starting in the 1920s.
Today, cheerleading groups are overwhelmingly
female.
Cheerleading’s roots are closely tied to
American football’s. The first intercollegiate game
was played in 1869, between Princeton University and
Rutgers University in New Jersey, and by the 1880s,
Princeton had formed an all-male pep club.
A graduate of Princeton, Thomas Peebles, took the
Princeton cheers to the University of Minnesota,
where football and fight songs were becoming very
popular.
In 1889, University of Minnesota was on a losing streak,
and a medical student named Johny Campbell assembled a group
to energize the team to victory with the first organized
cheer: “Rah, Rah, Rah! Ski-U-Mah! Hoo-Rah! Hoo-Rah! Varsity!
Varsity! Minnesota!”
Cheerleading grew from there. It wasn’t until 1923 that
women were allowed to cheer for the first time, at the
University of Minessota. During this decade, cheerleaders
added tumbling and acrobatics to their routines, and a
University of Oregon cheerleader used flashcards for the
first time. [Video]
Lawrence Herkimer introduced the pom pom, which
was a big addition to cheerleading history.
Herkimer has to be seen as the “grandfather of
cheerleading”. He has done so much for the history
of cheerleading by founding the National
Cheerleading Association and holding cheerleading
schools way back in 1946 and ‘47.
Today, the sport has evolved into a highly
athletic and competitive field displaying males and
females of incredible talent. Herkimer and
University of Minnesota have carved out a unique
history of cheerleading.
1883 - Great Britain: students began cheering their
favourite athletes on at sporting events
1884 - Princeton: Thomas Peebles started a yell of
"Sis Boom Rah!”
1889 - University of Minnesota: Johnny Campbell was
the first cheerleader. Campbell started yelling with
a megaphone "Rah, Rah, Rah! Ski-U-Mah! Hoo-Rah!
Varsity! Minn-e-so-tah!" After that, people started
calling him a yell leader.
1899 - University of Minnesota: Johnny and five guy
friends organized cheers, fight songs, and raised
school pride. This was the first cheerleading squad.
1903 - Gamma Sigma is named the first cheerleading
fraternity
1910 - University of Illinois: held the first
Homecoming Week
1923 - University of Minnesota: Female students are
allowed to cheer, they bring tumbling and gymnastics
to the routines
1949 - Dallas: Herkimer has the first workshop under
the NCA name
1950 - Santa Cruz, Ca: Herkimer develops the Herkie
jump and NCA in incorporated

1953 - Herkimer founds the Cheerleading Supply


Company
1956 - Herkimer invents the first pompom
1960 - Baltimore: the Colts add the first
professional cheerleading squad in history
1967 - Pop Warners cheerleaders are added to pee wee
football

1968 - Fred Gasthoff makes the first vinyl pompom


1972 - Title IX was passed. Varsity is founded, so
was the famous Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders
1973 - Cheerleaders start cheering for women's
sports
1974 - Jeff Webb quits his job with NCA and starts
up UCA

1976 - UCA shows their first liberty (stunt) at


summer camp 1979- UCA shows their first basket toss
at a summer camp
1980 - All Star squads start forming everywhere
1995 - American Cheerleader Magazine make its debut
1997 - 15 states say that cheerleading is a sport
1998 - Minnesota: The Cheerleading Alliance is
founded
1999 - ESPN on the record says that cheerleading is
a sport

[Video]
NATURE OF CHEER DANCE

Cheerleading was originally meant to cheer school


basketball and football teams as they compete, and
was mainly a combination of dance and gymnastics.
This original function of the groups cheering for
athletic teams is still there, but our cheer dancing
also drew from another American tradition – the pep
squads.
Pep squads were slightly different from
cheerleading groups. Pep squads were associated more
with elementary and high schools and emphasized
school spirit.

The UAAP cheer dancing groups have mostly adopted


the name Pep Squad and have become varsity teams in
their own right, meaning they don’t just cheer on
the basketball teams but are themselves competing
teams, which is why we have this separate one-day
event where all the UAAP schools compete.
In form and substance, our cheer dancing has
evolved into a sport and more importantly as an art.
The dance and gymnastics components form the core of
cheer dancing, but there are variations in what each
school emphasizes.

There is a theatrical showmanship in cheer


dancing which makes it so Filipino. Cheer dancing is
of course much more modest with the props, but the
universities invested on the costumes and
accessories.

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