Frankie Manning, Requiescat in pace

1914 – 2009

Google News only returns one story about the passing of Frankie Manning this morning, but his devotees spread the sad news on Facebook and Twitter throughout the day.  Even though we knew he had been in the hospital with pneumonia for the past ten days, and had suffered a fall last year, it still seemed incredible that he would pass, at least not before another of his famous birthdays — there was a five-day fête scheduled next month, the latest in a series that has stretched from his 80th year to his 95th.  Throughout what should have been his old age, Frankie continued to teach — and dance — with remarkable energy and flexibility, his body and his smile beaming with a love for what he was doing and those who joined him.  It seemed like he would live forever.

His enthusiasm drew huge crowds, dancers flocking to honor one of the founding fathers of swing.  Frankie helped pioneer and revive the Lindy Hop, a dance of graceful flamboyance that takes years just to master the basics.  At 21, Manning was already one of the greatest.  His most stunning feat was the first ever “air step,” introduced at the legendary Savoy Ballroom in 1935, what we call today “aerials,” popularized by this dazzling GAP Swing commercial.

The feat was an instant sensation, and Frankie was marked as a master of the form.  He spent the rest of the swing era choreographing and performing with the best dancers in the country.  Probably the most notorious clip of his dance troop comes from the 1941 movie Hellzapoppin’, generally reckoned as the fastest lindy hopping ever recorded.

While hobbyists swoon at his virtuosity, there’s more than just the entertainment value to his dancing.  The second act of Frankie’s life has a serendipitous quality, highly reminiscent of Star Wars.  Before the swing revival of the 80s and 90s, the few enthusiasts had even fewer teachers.  Swing dancing, like many folk arts, might have died with the last of the old guard.  Wikipedia provides the Jedi moment:

In 1982, Al Minns, a former member of Whitey’s Lindy Hoppers, started to teach Lindy Hop at the Sandra Cameron Dance Center where he introduced a new generation of dancers to the Lindy Hop. Before he died in 1985, he told his students that Manning, another surviving member of Whitey’s Lindy Hoppers, also lived in New York City.

They found him working at the Post Office, a reluctant and then magnanimous teacher.  He could have faded in obscurity, but his students, or maybe dancing, revitalized him.  He was talented, sparkling, ageless — now, as always, a legend.

Teaching a class at age 92.  Photo Credit: WindsorSwingKid under a Creative Commons License on Flickr.

“If I wasn’t dancing I don’t think I would have reached this age. You get to dance with a beautiful young lady . . . You get to fall in love for two and a half minutes of music and if that don’t keep you young, I don’t know what do . . . Life is wonderful!”

Update I: His obituary in the New York Times.

Update II:  LA Times obituary.  Also, a realy interesting look at the sociology of the swing revivial, with great clips.