West High Jr. Historian Dancers

The West Junior Historians were organized in 1973 when former Superintendent M.F. Kruse was president of the Heart of Texas American Heritage Association. Milton “Poone” Morgan volunteered his services as sponsor to form and organize the high school group. The club was open to only junior and senior students at the time. Each member was required to have a project which could be writing nonfiction articles about local history, refinishing old furniture, restoring old machinery or making etchings of interesting historical gravestones. The projects were submitted for competition at the Texas Junior Historian Annual Meeting and History Fair.

With the nation's bicentennial in the near future, Mr. Morgan decided that the members needed to learn the Czech national dance, The Moravian Beseda. The group of sixteen students began to learn the dance in January of 1976 and held their first public performance on March 5th of the same year. The girls wore the traditional costume of a black vest, red skirt and white ruffled shirt and apron while the boys wore a button down white long sleeve shirt with a bow at the neck and black vest with two rows of rickrack. This group was awarded a trophy at the 37th annual state meeting for being one of the six outstanding high school clubs in Texas.

In September 1976, the West Junior Historians performed their one dance, the fifteen minute Moravian Beseda, at the first annual WestFest. The group was invited to perform for the first time on Czech Day at the State Fair of Texas in October of the same year.