Pat grew up in Nelson in Lancashire and learnt dances from her mother, members of her family and local people. In the 1960s she started interviewing older dancers – many of whom at first denied they had ever clog danced – adding numerous previously unrecorded steps.
In the book she describes the rise of the cotton industry and how working footwear – the clog – became a medium for dance, admired and copied by music hall entertainers like Dan Leno. Pat describes its popularity in Lancashire with ‘Corner Boys’, the fiercely contested clog competitions and the closely kept dance steps of individual dancers. Pat describes the decline of clog dancing from its Victorian heyday and its eventual revival, which to a great extent she made possible.
The book is lavishly illustrated and contains the notations for many of the dances collected and devised by Pat Tracey.
50% of the receipts go to the Alzheimer’s Society.
