The Vintage Twirler preserves and shares the history, culture, traditions, and legacy of baton twirling and majorette performance through education, storytelling, archival preservation, and advocacy.
Please join the Baton Twirling Preservation Society.
The Vintage Twirler preserves and shares the history, culture, traditions, and legacy of baton twirling and majorette performance through education, storytelling, archival preservation, and advocacy.
Join the Baton Twirling Preservation Society.
How To Explore the Vintage Twirler
The Vintage Twirler offers four ways to explore, understand, and preserve baton twirling history.
Website
What happened?
Discover biographies, photographs, historical research, timelines, champion lists, and archival discoveries from the world of baton twirling.
HoopLa (Free Substack)
What’s new?
Stay up to date community news, historical curiosities, exhibits, announcements, and noteworthy finds from across the twirling world.
HoopLa Plus (Paid Substack)
Why does it matter?
Explore deeper analysis, historical interpretation, long-form features and opinion/commentary.
Baton Twirling Preservation Society
How can I help preserve it?
Subscribe to HoopLa! It’s $5 a month and every month you’ll get a sticker of the Vintage Twirler of the Month!
All free HoopLa subscribers automatically become members of the Baton Twirling Preservation Society.
See Collections
We are building an archive of baton twirling images and stories from the 20th Century. ollections featured on this site are only partially complete. Those with red stars have content.
Share Your Stories and Pictures
Support and celebrate the rich history and heritage of baton twirling through the collection, preservation and online display of historic materials. Help add to the historical record of a sport underreported and poorly documented by mainstream media.
Unfortunately, lost in the mists of time are stories and pictures. Without ever being interviewed, baton twirling heroes and legends pass away. Lost forever are the viewpoints, perspectives and even eyewitness accounts that shape the historical record. As such, the documented history of twirling becomes limited or inaccessible and priceless photos and ephemera are lost, stolen, trashed and/or destroyed, etc.
Posts Memorials and Tributes
Memorials are for the dearly departed. Tributes honor the living. We invite you to publish a free memorial or tribute honoring someone who has impacted your journey in the sport of twirling.
Thank you for allowing the legacies of those who have gone before us live online and inspire others to give selflessly to this sport.
Become A Twirling Historian
The Baton Twirling Preservation Society is looking for Twirling Historians from across the country to help research, document and preserve the history of baton twirling — one state at a time.
Thank You
Thank you for helping preserve the history of baton twirling. We are preserving photographs to understand what our lives have meant and sharing your stories to gain a deeper understanding of experiences.
We invite you to share your stories and pictures with us. No story is too small, no photo too grainy.
Top Photo: Bettye Lou Sorrells (1936-2022) leads the Gilmer Buckeye Band down Buffalo Street, Gilmer, Texas, 1953. Photo Credit: Growing Up Gilmer
Most Recent Posts
Lebanon County HS Majorettes (1984-85) and the Pepsi Pumper
Floyd County High School Majorettes, Kentucky, 1985. The Floyd County High School Majorettes (Lebanon Junction, Kentucky) pose aboard a bright yellow Pepsi Pumper, a promotional vehicle designed to look like a fire engine. The vehicle was used for public appearances,...
This How You Dream
This Is How You DreamKaren Jordan, CEO & Artistic DirectorNew Orleans East Satin Dolls School of Dance As a little girl growing up in the Iberville Project, I remember going to parades on Canal Street with my mother and siblings. I would watch in awe as the bands...
Manzanar Majorette: September Vintage Twirler of the Month
The September Vintage Twirler of the Month was inspired by the Manzanar majorettes. Here is an excerpt from my August 13, 2023 post, “Japanese Internment Camps Featured Baton Twirling Lessons.” The sticker will be mailed to paid subscribers of the Vintage Twirler...
Vintage Ephemera
Baton twirling ephemera refers to things like programs, posters, patches, stickers, magazines, newsletters, and other things typically written or printed that were used for a specific period of time.
Submit History
We welcome high-quality scans of your vintage baton twirling ephemera. You can also receive items through the mail. We’ll digitally preserve your memories in high-quality scans. Thank you so much for supporting this project.