GREENFIELD — Those who went grocery shopping at the Greenfield Stop & Shop on Saturday morning were met with a surprise: a coordinated dance by members of the Bernardston Senior Center.
Shortly after 10 a.m., more than 30 seniors from Bernardston and a few members of the South County Senior Center descended upon Stop & Shop’s produce aisle to dance to Chubby Checker’s hit “The Twist.”
The idea came from Marsha Staples-Love, who teaches exercise classes at the Bernardston Senior Center, South County Senior Center and Franklin County’s YMCA, and Bernardston Senior Center Director Pam Parmakian. Staples-Love said she includes “The Twist” in every class she leads, and Parmakian suggested they share the fun with others in public.
“I always love to dance and it’s a good workout. It always makes us smile,” Staples-Love said. “Nobody said because we’re old and we have to exercise, we can’t have fun. So we do.”
Parmakian said after going to one of the Senior Center’s exercise classes, she pitched the idea of bringing “The Twist” to a public spot, which the participants enthusiastically supported. She then began looking for a good location to host the surprise dance. Stop & Shop Store Manager Mike Renkie and corporate leadership were on board with the idea and intrigued, as they had never had any coordinated dances at the store before.
She added that the goal of bringing the dance to Stop & Shop was just to make people smile, and she hoped both the dancers and shoppers had fun.
Among the dancers was T.J. Strahan, who said getting to dance “The Twist” in public again felt extra special, given that 64 years ago the dance had once been banned.
In 1962, “The Twist” was banned at Greenfield Junior High after school officials ruled it was “offensive” and in “poor taste,” as was reported in the Greenfield Recorder.
“It just isn’t the type of dance we feel should be encouraged among our students,” Principal Chester Osgood told the Recorder at the time.
In response to the school’s decision, Strahan, a student at the time, and his classmates protested. They gathered more than 500 signatures, which led to the decision being reversed, and “The Twist” was allowed at the school dance.
“The best part about this is I met Chubby Checker years later, in 1969 in Chicago, and I told him, ‘You made me famous in junior high school,'” Strahan recalled. “He said, ‘What do you mean?’ We were in an elevator together and I told him about ‘The Twist’ petition”
According to Strahan, Checker had told him he was amazed at the students’ determination.
Strahan added that while his ankles aren’t as good as they were in the 1960s and he has to stand in one place while dancing, he still loves to “Twist.”
