Legacy Library

Legacy Library

Legacy Library is a new initiative of the PSDF Archive focused on preserving and curating audio and video from the 1920’s through the 1950’s and beyond. In collaboration with Nick Williams, our first effort focuses on digitizing and preserving Nick’s extensive personal collection of video clips collected over decades.

15.27% Raised
$15,270.00 donated of $100,000.00 goal
96 Donors

Legacy Library is a new initiative of the PSDF Archive specifically focused on preserving and curating audio and video from the 1920’s through the 1950’s and beyond, and includes dances such as Lindy Hop, Balboa, Charleston, Swing, Collegiate Shag, and Vernacular Jazz. The video collection draws from films, soundies, home videos, dance events, and rare private lesson footage. In collaboration with Nick Williams, our first effort focuses on digitizing and preserving Nick’s extensive personal collection of video clips collected over decades.

The Legacy Library is dedicated to preserving the history of our beloved swing dances and honoring the legends of those individuals who shaped them. It is also intended to serve as an educational resource for the historical and ongoing cultural impact of both the swing dances and the dancers who brought them to life.

Best of all, the PSDF Legacy Library will be accessible to all!

We have ambitious goals and need the financial support of the community to realize them. Donated funds will be used to secure the expertise of archivists, historians, editors, and film transfer specialists to create and curate the Library. Wherever possible PSDF intends to contract with professionals from within the greater swing dance community in order to continue investing in our collective future.

We also need your help to boost the signal. Please share this everywhere you can!

Thank you for supporting the Legacy Library!

Sponsor a Tape!

Supporters at or above the $500 level will have the option to choose a specific tape to sponsor from among Nick Williams’ collection and to join Legacy Clip Geeks — a group for nerds who like to geek out about clips.

  • Sponsors at or above $500 will have the option to choose a tape to sponsor. Sponsoring a tape helps pay for that tape to be digitized, catalogued, and curated.
  • Sponsors will be given their choice of tape on a first-come, first-served basis.
  • Tape sponsors will receive sponsorship credit for the clips contained on “their” tape and in the Pacific Swing Dance Archive.

58 Comments

  2. Excited to watch and learn from the video archive. Thanks to everyone working to make this project possible.

  4. South Korea presents a challenging environment for learning the Balboa.
    Learning not only about the dance’s technique but also its history, the images and stories of its old-time dancers, is even more challenging.
    I hope this digitization of these historical materials will help many dancers around the world learn about its history.

  6. As a swing dancer I am fond of Swing dance history and I love watching those old (or not so old) footages. This is an amazing task and I love the idea.

  7. This is important to me so that “THE KIDS” who decide to dance in the future can see what it really means to belong to this community.

  8. I am super excited to see all the videos and be inspired! Keep integrity of the dance for next generation

  12. It is important in preserving the past so we ALL remain connected to where swing was rooted from. Thanks for taking on this challenge Nick and co.!

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