50 Random Pictures of People Dancing in the 1960s-1970s

Enjoy a hodgepodge of 50 found photos and other ephemera featuring ladies and gents cutting a rug back in the late 1960s through the 70s.  Some are a tad strange, some  demand explanation, but all are an interesting look at folks having a good time in decades past.

 

dance fever vintage picture

(1) It looks like every single person is dancing to a different song.

vintage dancing

(2) There something just a little bit “off” about this dance.  I think I’d have to sit this one out.

vintage dancers

(3) That moment when you get assigned a dance partner, and he’s the creepiest guy in the room.

1969 club pardiso in amsterdam

(4) Club Paradiso in Amsterdam, 1969

1978 party

(5) A 1978 dance party, featuring sexy disco dollies, white-shirted studs… and a lone sweaty guy who doesn’t belong.

vintage dancers 2

(6) A couple teens awkwardly cutting a rug, while (7) our lady in red spandex is about to show this disco how it’s done.

dancing vintage

(8) In da club

dance humor mad magazine

A little dance humor courtesy MAD Magazine

006_I'm Your Boogie Man

(9) A torn (but mended) old photo of a school dance.  For more like this see: Teens Behaving Awkwardly: A Look at the 1970s High School Dance

1970s dancing

(10) Doesn’t it sometimes seem like the seventies were one big party for adults?  I know it isn’t true, but damn they looked like they were having a good time back then.

dance competition vintage

(11) Looks like a dance competition in the school gym; take a look at the size of that guy’s shirt collar.  If he jumps up, he may stay airborne.

023_Leopard Print A-Go Go

(12) They loved their multiple exposure photography in those days.  For more see: Vinyl Over-Exposed: The Awful Multi-Exposure Album Cover Trend of the 1960s-70s

vintage dancing 3

(13) White people dancing – not always a pretty sight.

dancing in the seventies

(14) One nation under a groove.

dancing in the seventies 2

(15) Hell yes.  Maybe my favorite picture of them all.  Just gettin’ it on, colorblind and in the moment.

1960s dancing concert

(16) Oh, man.  I could look at this photograph all day.   A wonderful snapshot of a carefree moment in the late sixties.

026_college mixer

(17) This is from an old college yearbook

old dance photo

(18) From a newspaper – just old and grainy enough to be a tad creepy

vintage school dance

(19) Gettin’ down on the parquet floor

vintage dance lessons

(20) Dance lessons in the late seventies.

1972---Wembley-Stadium

(21) 1972, Wembley Stadium

vintage dancers 6

(22) I dig that paisley dress; a groovy pad to dance and party I’m sure.  I’m also pretty sure where this is all going to lead.

045_Sadie Hawkins Day Party 1960

(23) Found photos of a 1960 Sadie Hawkins Dance

found photograph dance

(24) A found photograph which finally proves definitively that mustard yellow was the most popular color of 1969.

January 1963

(25) From Topper magazine dated January 1963

1970s caveman party

(26) 1970s caveman dance party

050_Viva la Poofy Sleeves

(27) Alas, I have no backstory for this found photo; nothing to explain the gigantic poofy sleeves and that creepy old woman in the background.

122_disco

(28) “I love the nightlife, I got to boogie, On the disco ’round, oh yea.”

124_disco 3

(29) Disco fashion was tacky; but I wouldn’t complain if it made a comeback.

vintage dancing seventies

(30) If only he could’ve seen the faces behind him, he might have taken it down a notch.

lady dancing 1970s

(31) Sometimes, you don’t want to dance. You just want to watch.

1979 Disco Etiquette

(32) From a 1979 article in Playboy called “David Steinberg’s Guide to Disco Etiquette”.

At the 1970s Dance

(33) A couple found photographs from the same dance, year unknown (looks like very early seventies).

vintage dancers 5

(34) A beatnik coffee house in 1960

1970s dancers

(35) Another example of that multi-exposure photography they loved so much.

vintage dancing sixties

(36) More parquet floor dancing

1970s performers (21)

(37) Not sure what this performance is, but I’m sure it was worth the ticket price.

078_1967

(38) Dancers in 1967

vintage school dance

(39) Swing to the music of Stonehenge? I presume this a local band playing at the school dance.

1970s dance partners

(40) The 1970s.  A classy time.

jukebox dance

(41) Detail from a Wurlitzer Zodiac jukebox advertisement

dancing 1970s 4

(42) and (43) A true ladykiller in action

nighthawks movie

(44) From the movie Nighthawks, starring Rutger Hauer, Billy Dee Williams, Sylvester Stallone and Lindsay Wagner

vintage dancers 4

(45) The guys in the yellow sweaters are puttin’ on a clinic tonight on the dance floor.

1968 dancing

(46) Dancing ’68

vintage dancing 1970s

(47) Dancing out on the grass in heals, chugging cheap alcohol from paper cups – this is truly living the dream. (48) Did you just say I couldn’t dance?  Hold my beer.

dancing 1970s

(49) – (50) Whether you’re a middleschooler or a Schwarzenegger, dancing was for everyone in the sixties and seventies.  Cheers.

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