BELLEFONTE — Five couples brought swinging fun to the Bellefonte Cruise over the weekend as they danced for top honors at the 2nd annual Bellefonte Historical and Cultural Association’s Jitterbug Contest.
Dancers competed on Saturday, June 20 for cash prizes — $250, $100, and $50. The contest was held in front of the main stage on the Diamond in front of the courthouse.
There were four short songs for dancers to jive to the title. The first song was a warm-up; the second and third songs were used by the judges to determine the three finalists. The last song determined the first, second, and third prize winners.
This year, Jacob Sacco and Cora DeFrancesco won first prize; Anna Witmer and Robert Thompson won second prize; and Presley Dougherty and CJ Witherell won third prize.
BHCA President Joseph Griffin initiated the contest in 2024 because the organization offers music programming as well as som.
“Dance is in our wheelhouse, but we hadn’t done anything involving dance for as long as I can remember,” Griffin said in a statement. “I invented the Jitterbug Contest to remedy that and to get involved with the Cruise.”
He said another reason for starting the Jitterbug Contest was the “vibe” of the Friday night Sock Hop at the Cruise.
“Many of the cars at the show are from the 50s and 60s, so Jitterbug rhymes with that as well,” Griffin continued. “The contest is quite entertaining, so we are working on promoting it harder to attract more couples.”
DeFrancesco and Sacco are both swing dance instructors from the Penn State Swing Dance Club. The couple — who are dance partners and life partners — moved to State College just short of a year ago from Oklahoma where they met. DeFrancesco, who hails from New Bloomfield, is currently a PhD student at Penn State studying astronomy. Sacco is from Houston, Texas.
“I’ve been dancing for about four years and Jacob has been partner dancing since he was in college, including vintage swing dancing,” DeFrancesco said. “We compete swing dancing both in Lindy Hop and West Coast Swing. We travel across the country to compete.”
All three couples who placed in the contest are all instructors with the Penn State Swing Dance Club.
“We were all dancing a combination of Lindy Hop and Charleston, which are other vintage swing dances, the major influences of Jitterbug,” DeFrancesco said of the Bellefonte Cruise contest. “We tried to enter last year’s Bellefonte Cruise Jitterbug Contest and it was rained out. So, it was exciting for us to compete in it this year because it was the first thing we learned about Bellefonte.”
Next year’s contest is scheduled for June 19.
