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Alex BousteadLeader of the promenade ALEX BOUSTEAD Square dancing was a lifelong passion for Toronto-born caller, who took up the pastime during the tough Depression yearsToronto Star 29 Jan 2007 DALE ANNE FREED STAFF REPORTER “Ahhh . . . meet your partner pass her by, wink at another on the sly, kiss the next one as ya go by.” — Alex Boustead, In his own way, Alex Boustead was a keeper of Canadian culture. With his smooth, deep voice and a twinkle in his eye, he’d keep the square dancers doe-si doeing with his fast-paced lively calls. His calls originated with the early settlers and preserved a bit of oral culture, passed down through the decades. “Being loyal Canadians, we wanted to preserve our traditional olde tyme dances . . . English, Irish, Scottish and French, each contribute part of their dances . . . jigs, reels, quadrilles,” Boustead wrote in a newsletter to the Old Tyme Square Dance Callers Association. He danced his entire life, through the bad times and the good. It was a life-long passion. “If you had worries, you’d have to forget them because you can’t think and square dance at the same time,” he told the Star in 1989 during a break at the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair. Boustead died in 2007 at the age of 94. “Square dancing was basically his life. When he wasn’t calling, he was dancing,” said his friend George Betts, a protégé who learned the art of square dance calling from Boustead. “He had his own style, his own style of delivery, his own cadence.” In an effort to preserve traditional square dancing, Boustead and six others formed the Canadian Olde Tyme Square Dance Callers Association in 1954. Boustead was treasurer for the first 10 years, a position his son Wallace holds today. The association is a teaching centre for square-dance callers. Toronto-born Boustead caught the dance bug back in the Depression. During those tough years he lost his job as a machinist at Stelco. He took on any job his hometown of Stirling needed. He swept roads, cut wood and, using a pick and shovel, helped level the town dump into a park where kids could play. In his spare time, he loved to dance. “Dances were put on by the working man for 10 cents a time,” he told the Star in 1996. “But if you didn’t have the money, you were welcome to join the fun.” During the Depression, there’d be dances six nights a week, he said. “There were no jobs to speak of, and no TVs — there was nothing much to do. But you had to do something with your energy so there were a lot of square dances.” Although he didn’t have a lot of money he always managed to have a clean white shirt for the dance. “I had a friend . . . who would pass along discarded white shirts. I would turn the collars and sew them back on so that I would be presentable.” Although just 5-foot-4, he was a dominating presence on the stage as he called out the dances, said his son Wallace, 67. His first call was “Darling Nellie Gray” and he stood on a table with a paper megaphone, next to an old fellow playing an accordion. “Sometimes I called for free, other nights it was for five or 10 dollars,” Boustead wrote. Over the years he called with various radio and TV stations and many other groups. Sometimes he and his band “the Country Ramblers” would travel some 150 kilometres “bringing Canadian dancing to the people,” Boustead wrote. He had a signature look and style, showing up at every dance he called in a white shirt and bow tie or string tie. For years he ran at least one weekly dance from September to May. During World War II he taught square dancing at Toronto’s YMCA, said his son. And when the clock struck midnight, his son said, everyone knew it was time for Alex Boustead to sing “the Home Waltz.” “Until we meet again,” he’d warble. |