Stepping up

It’s Tuesday night at The Harbor Cocktail Lounge in downtown Fort Pierce. Tables and chairs are moved to the perimeter, exposing century-old wood flooring. It’s about to take a beating. Wild Roses, a Port St. Lucie-based nonprofit, leads and instructs weekly line dancing at the venue from 7 to 9 pm. “A lot of our people wear boots,” co-founder Wendie Smith said. “When they stomp on this floor, it’s amazing.”

Natasha Mitchell owns The Harbor. “Tuesdays were generally slow for us,” Mitchell said, “but having [Wild Roses] come in, we have a crowd. Each week, it’s more and more.”

Line dancing has a global history. In New Zealand, the haka is a powerful, indigenous dance that is sometimes performed by sports teams to intimidate opponents. Israel is famous for the horah. Other countries and groups have their own versions.

The genre has been popular here since disco days. Who hasn’t experienced the Electric Slide on cruises or at wedding receptions? These days, it is primarily associated with country-western music and boots.

Line dancing is choreographed, sequenced. Rows of dancers usually face the same direction, rotating with sets of movements: grapevines, ball changes, coaster steps and others. Instructors break down the new steps, repeating segments until students are ready to move on. 

“You only need two things to line dance,” Smith said. “The first is the absolute desire to do it. The second is, don’t be afraid to make a fool of yourself — because we all do. You just need good instructors, like us!”

Wild Rose’s co-founder DeeDee Maynard makes it even simpler: “If you can count to eight and walk into the building, you can line dance.”

For years, Wild Roses provided free, public line dancing at Tail-Gators Brews & Grill in Port St. Lucie. In March, Tail-Gators’ social media announced that “due to circumstances out of our control we will not be hosting Line Dancing on Mondays any longer,” saying they would miss Wild Roses, “an excellent organization.” 

Wild Roses currently offers classes at The Harbor, Islamorada Brewing & Distillery, Meadowwood Golf and Tennis Club, and the Moose lodge, all in Fort Pierce. “We’re still trying to get back into Port St. Lucie,” Maynard said. “We just haven’t found the spot yet.”  

LEGACY

Wild Roses was born in 2012 with a vision for a dance team. Today it has two prongs: a professional team and classes. These complement each other, as students have gone on to compete and teach professionally. In 2023, the Wild Roses team was the first US group to go to the World Dance Masters championship in England. 

“There were eight different countries,” Smith said. “We were the oldest group and competed against people half our age. We just didn’t want to come in last, but we got second place.”

Today, individual students or couples turn to Wild Roses for help with competitions. “We support them with fundraisers, help coach or connect them with other coaches,” Smith said. “We help with music and choreography.”

No longer competing themselves and cutting back on the classes they teach personally, Smith and Maynard have passed on the vision to others — like Kimberly Wittey of Stuart.

“She came and said, ‘I really want to do what you’re doing,’” Maynard said. “Her father had been an instructor; we danced with him. So she’s carrying on that legacy.”

Smith started dancing when she was 4. She trained in contemporary and classical dance through high school, when she switched to band. Later, she danced professionally. Maynard took tap and ballet when she was 2, which she says “doesn’t count. But when I took my first line dance class, I became addicted. [The teacher] took me under her wing.”

That teacher, Cathy Townsend, is now a St. Lucie County commissioner. When she decided to step away from teaching, Maynard took over her classes. “She and Wendie built something truly special, taking it to a level I could’ve only imagined,” Townsend said. “Over the years, they’ve done incredible things for our community, giving back in countless ways. Their love for people shines through everything they do.”

REAL COMMUNITY

Smith and Maynard’s motivation for changing to nonprofit status was personal: in 2013, Smith’s daughter Katy Stalnaker was in a serious accident three days before Smith was scheduled to attend the Boston Showdown, a dance convention. 

News spread quickly. “The line dance community is a great big, gigantic family,” she said. 

A 2013 World Line Dance newsletter relates how immediate support materialized: She is just now coming out of an induced coma but had many internal injuries and this lovely young girl has lots of people cheering her on and praying her through this ordeal...People lined up to donate...and I know Katy’s family really appreciated it and are touched by how many people are supporting them through this horrible time.

“That’s how we decided that we need to give back,” Maynard said. “We realized how much good our dance community can do. The upper echelon of the line dance world reached out, helped, called. It was amazing.”

Wild Roses donates time and expertise to such organizations as the Inner Truth Project, GraceWay Village and the Boys and Girls Club. They have held raffles and events to fight epilepsy and glioblastoma; to assist a Miss Rodeo Queen with travel expenses; to suppport a family whose baby was in the NICU; and to help a single mother battling breast cancer. Area businesses, such as Neese Roofing and Just Gold Jewelry, have helped them help others.

“DeeDee and I both — and honestly, all of our dancers — just want to give back,” Smith said. “This community has given us so much.”