Throwback Thursday: 1950s vintage Easter outings
Decked out in their Easter finery, undergraduate students attended the first annual Easter Ball on April 13, 1957. The ballroom of the Sheraton-Mount Royal Hotel bustled with more than 300 couples who paid the $10 for a ticket to the gala dinner dance.
The toe-tapping rhythms of Eddie Alexander and his orchestra kept everyone on the dance floor, swaying to tunes by Perry Como, Pat Boone and Paul Anka. A popular jazz trio played during dinner (think Waldorf salad and Montreal melon), as guests discussed the day’s hot topics — the Ziegfeld Follies, Yul Brynner’s Academy Award for The King and I and the growing rebellion against President Fulgencio Batista in Cuba.
Congratulations and thanks went out to the evening’s sponsors, the Association of the Alumni of Sir George Williams College.
Just two years earlier, the Alumni Easter dance was a less formal affair, with casual attire and a cabaret structure. For $3 a ticket, couples danced in the Mount Royal Hotel's ballroom to the orchestra’s renditions of chart toppers by the Platters, Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole. Festivities went on until 2 a.m. A jolly time was had by all.
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