Some of you may remember that the night before graduation, way back then, a sizeable group of us got all radical and went to a–gasp!–dance club. This was on top of the highly unusual, Footloose-style rebellion that was the post-Junior/Senior banquet dance-o-rama on Phil Showalter’s tennis court.
I don’t know what the dance place was really called, but it was in Verona and we referred to it as “Eli’s.” I live near Verona now, and occassionally drive by that spot. It was off the street in a metal shack sort of place, and it’s now Harvest Life Church or something like that. So thankfully, it has found redemption.
But a teen dance club by the same name recently sprang up on Rt. 11 between Verona and Weyers Cave. I saw the signs for it–Eli’s Fun Center–as did my son, whose name is Eli. When additional signs started popping up nearby for “Club Eli’s,” a weekend teen dance extravaganza, I got suspicious that the place had been revived.
Indeed it had. An article in our local weekly rag, the Northern Augusta Journal, had an interview with the owners of the place. Here is an excerpt:
At some point in their lives, most men and women experience a mid-life crisis. Be it fast cars, expensive clothes, or a wild new hairstyle, people will do anything to stay young. [Editor's note: Let's hope Miss Beachy didn't see the dangling parts of that sentence.] But for Dan and Carol Shifflet, that mid-life crisis manifested itself in a new fun center and dance club aimed at providing safe fun….
For the Shifflets, the motivation to keep the club going comes from a mixture of goodwill and nostalgia. More than 25 years ago, the couple remembers dancing the night away at Club Eli’s, which was under different management and eventually closed down. Students lined up around the block, waiting hours just to get in.
“A lot of people met their husbands and wives there,” Dan said.
I don’t know if any of us met our husbands or wives there, but it does go to show that everything old is new, and everything new is pretty much old. Also, that we are pretty much old.
One saving grace, I guess: They have metal detectors now. So at least we were non-violent radicals.
