Twelve Years of Yehoodi (reprint from 2010)

EDITOR NOTE: Spuds wrote this in October of 2010 when we were unveiling the new “Yehoodi 3.1” site. Still lots of great memories that are worth remembering!

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“12 Years of Yehoodi” by Manu Smith, October 2010 

Yehoodi.com just reached its twelfth year in existence and it’s been one of the most rewarding experiences in my life. I can still remember the nights I would spend, up until two in the morning manually (pardon the pun) updating the news page so that lindy hoppers would have something to read the next day. Yehoodi has come a long way from those days, but it’s still challenging me and keeping me busy writing code, thinking of enhancements and enjoying the great discussions by the users.

I won’t bore you with the stories about how Yehoodi got started and the whole history lesson. I want to take a trip into the past to highlight some of the events over the last twelve years that stand out in my mind about our little lindy-hopper-built home on the inter webs.

1998: Yehoodi 1st Anniversary and meeting Rayned

The first party we had was partially for the public and partially for the site creators. We had a party that was hosted at the Swing46 Club in New York. People came from as far as Philadelphia (at least I know that Snora and Droolia did) to dance and celebrate our first year. After that, all the Yehoodistrators got together for dinner at the now closed Marion’s Restaurant in the Village. I can still remember that pork chop I had, yum.

I also remember being at the 1998 American Lindy Hop Championships and rooming with Yehoodi co-founder Frankyboy. We were across the hall from Minnie’s Moocher’s, who would later dominate the team division at the competition. We put up a small Yehoodi sign on the hotel room door and left it ajar so that people could come in if they wanted. We didn’t think anyone would come, but a gentleman from DC by the name of Rayned Wiles pushed the door open and said, “Hey, you are the Yehoodi guys!” Having a high profile guy like Rayned introduce himself to us meant so much.

1999: From manual to automatic

I slowly got tired of writing html code until the wee hours of the night to update the website and began playing with a little web language called php. This would allow me to access a database that would keep the stories that I posted and display them on the news page. Little did I know that language would be feeding my family in years to come.

One thing that not too many people know is that Yehoodi was built after a video games news site called Blues News (no, not the children’s television show). It was what every video game nerd read, day in and day out. I wanted that kind of place to get my lindy hop news, thus Yehoodi’s news page was born.

2000: They swing dance in Texas?

During a trip to a video game convention in Dallas Texas, Frankyboy and I wanted to get our dance-on. Where in the middle of Dallas could we get some lindy hop? We checked the web and found the Dallas Swing Dance Society weekly dance. Awesome. We hopped in a cab and drove to the venue.

When we got there, we were greeted at the front desk by an attractive, spunky young lady wearing a vintage dress. Frankyboy was wearing his Yehoodi t-shirt at the time. When the gal spotted the logo on the shirt, she announced, “Oh my gawd! You guys are from Yehoodi!” Boy did we feel like rockstars. Plus, we had no idea that people so far away from New York read the site. It was such a pleasant surprise and a wake-up-call that lindy hop dancing was living and breathing in places other than New York. That young lady, by the way, is coincidentally also named “Lindy”. Many of you may know her (wink, wink).

I happened to meet another spunky gal there, who was nice enough to drive Frank and I back to our convention after the dance was over. The then, nineteen year old lindy hopper is part of the reason that I decided to start a Texas branch of Yehoodi (she and I dated long distance for a few months after). She still posts to Yehoodi to this day under the username Beckto.

2001: Losing Cab Calloway

For the first few years of Yehoodi.com, we were using the image of Cab Calloway in our logo. As the site grew in popularity, we became incresingly aware that we probably didn’t want to get in trouble for using his image without permission from the Calloway estate or whomever owned it. After investigating what it would take to get to use his image with permission, we decided that we would simply remove it from the logo.

Yehoodi’s design and colors were loosely based on the CD collection of Cab Calloway songs entitled “Are You Hep to the Jive”, a fabulous collection if you don’t already own it. This is where the mustard and orange colors come from. Probably not a great color set for a website, but then again, it did make the site stand out from others. The major drawback to this is if you are surfing Yehoodi at work, someone from across the street could see it.

2002:  Welcome to Yehoodi. Please select a region

In our further attempts to expand the site from a local New York only scene to a global lindy community, we tried something in the 2.0 revision. Users were greeted with a landing page that asked them to pick a state before they could get to the site. Needless to say, this didn’t last very long and was quickly moved to a setting that the user could set in her preferences. The site had its first major redesign and also allowed events to be listed in any of the fifty states and many international regions. It was also at this time where our talk shows and radio show started gaining popularity and downloads were increasing. I can still remember sitting in my studio apartment in the East Village across a table from Rik Panganiban and discussing lindy hop news and events with various guest hosts on the “Yehoodi Talk Show”. The site wouldn’t get another redesign for the next eight years.

2003: Yehoodi Fifth Anniversary Party

One of the coolest anniversary parties I remember was Y5a. This one was in conjunction with the New York Lindy Hop Open at the Pennsylvania Hotel in New York, NY. The featured performers were Barbara Morrison and The Junior Mance Trio. Wow, what a night. Barbara was on fire and Junior, Earl and Jackie laid down some serious swing. 

One performer that I wasn’t prepared for was Paul Tillotson who played on Sunday night that weekend. There was a moment where Paul was putting down such a groove that I had to stop dancing and watch. Such a fun weekend.

2004: The Basie Centennial Ball

Probably the largest event Yehoodi.com has ever produced was The 2004 Count Basie Centennial Ball. Over 1,200 people attended what started as the fourth anniversary of Yehoodi and ended up being a gala event honoring Count Basie. Rockstars like Branford Marsalis and Bobby McFerrin were in attendance as we danced and celebrated  Mr Basie.

The even also featured the “Great Day In Lindy”, a photo shoot of as many lindy hoppers, young and old, as we could fit on the steps of Columbia University. I was inspired by the “Great Day In Harlem” photo that Art Kane did of the jazz musicians of the era and wanted something like that for lindy hoppers. The “Hellzapoppin’” competition also took place here. The worlds greatest dancers battled it out in front of a packed auditorium.

Probably the greatest moment for me was going with David Jacoby to visit Albert Murray  at his home. Mr. Murray wrote the Count Basie Autobiography “Good Morning Blues” and was a close friend of Mr. Basie. It was such an honor sitting in Mr. Murray’s house, hearing him talk about Basie and listening to his records. One of my favorite Basie recordings is now “Guest In A Nest” which Mr. Murray made us listen to twice. I will never forget that wonderful afternoon.

2005: Life gets in your eyes

After moving to California in 2003, I was slowly being pulled away from Yehoodi for many reasons. Trying to settle down in a new city, finding a new job, meeting new friends and traveling to teach lindy all drew my attention away from the site. There were no updates coming, no enhancements, nothing. It’s amazing what 3,000 miles will do.

2006 - 2009: Time keeps on slippin’

I’m going to lump these years up into one story, not because there was nothing going on during this time, our Yehoodi / Jelly Roll parties were pretty wicked, featuring The Earl May Quintet, Ernestine Anderson, The Roy Meriwether Trio and others. But the parties were getting smaller and smaller every year. Many of the Yehoodi organizers were busy with new families, jobs, opportunities that pulled us away from their passion of dancing.

In October of 2007, Rik Panganiban, Alex Burr and I, had a conference call. The plan was to start building Yehoodi.com version 3. We had so many ideas on what it would be and how three guys, using only our spare time would pull off such an enormous undertaking. The bottom line was that we still very much loved lindy hop, the community and the desire to keep Yehoodi.com fresh and new.

2010: Yehoodi 3.0 Launch

On January 4, (my birthday) 2010, we launched Yehoodi 3.0. It was the first redesign in eight years. It had some cool new things and some serious problems (as all new sites will), but it was and still is a labor of love.

Here we are at Yehoodi 3.1. We are still building, refining, working after hours writing code, holding conference calls, planning events, and somewhere in there, dancing. Yehoodi is a part of my life. This site has been there through some major life moments. From every Mermaid Parade win, to the attack on the World Trade Center on 9/11. From  Barbara Morrison’s first lindy hop performance, to Junior Mance and Ray Brown playing the same piano at a Yehoodi party. From the nights staying up to post the Supper Club’s new reduced prices, to my son being born. This site and lindy hop will always be part of me.

Yehoodi 3.1 screenshot