In 1952 I was present at a lecture by Frank Ford, no longer with us, who was the first ever 'Star Ballroom Champion' in 1927. He said that the sponsor was the 'Star' : a late afternoon London newspaper.

One of the other finalists in that very first 'Star Championship' was a young Welsh born actor, Ray Milland, who later went to Hollywood and won an Oscar for his performance in the film 'Lost Weekend' (1945), still avalable in the video stores as an old classic.

Frank Ford went on to say that the Tango was at that time a soft dance, something similar to an English Old Time Tango, until a German competitor turned up at Blackpool and on the floor performed this very staccato Tango, never seen before. He came nowhere in the competition, but the next day was swamped with requests to perform his style of the dance at their studios. Thus the Tango as we know it today was born.

Also Frank Ford spoke of how Victor Sylvester, a former world champion who was teaching ballroom dancing with his sister Gwen, came to be the first ever recorder of strict tempo music. The music at that time was all over the place. Crazy dances like the Black Bottom, Charleston and so on were coming and going by the month. It is hard for people today to realize that at that time few people even had a radio. The dance bands were attached to hotels. On old wax records you would see the name on the label of 'Harry Roy and the Savoy Hotel Orchestra', or 'The Palm Court'. There were many more. These hotels were where the well off people used to go dancing. Because of the lack of recordings featuring a constant tempo, which he needed for his studio, Victor Sylvester got a few musicians together and cut his own record. The rest is history. There was an immediate demand for his recordings from other teachers of dancing, which then flowed on to the general public. It is worth mentioning that people at that time were more likely to have a wind up phonograph than a wireless.

Victor Sylvester had the record for the longest running weekly program on BBC radio: twenty five years none stop, playing through the war years of World War 2. He also was the presenter with his band of the first ever television dance program when T.V. became available.

I can vouch for his popularity myself. When his group came to our local town hall once a year it was neccesary to buy a ticket at least six months beforehad (it was always an all ticket event).

Also in the final in that Star Championship was a then unknown actress who later became famous: Anna Neagle. I watched her on television in 'Courtneys of Curzon Street' (1947) only last week in which she dances an exhibition type of dance on a stage. I had seen her before jitterbugging in the film called 'I Live in Grosvenor Square' (1946). I could see in both where her former training came to the fore.