On a hot summer night in June of 1949, a crowd of over 24,000 gathered at a tobacco warehouse in downtown Rocky Mount. Eastern North Carolina humidity and the smell of dried tobacco leaves hung heavy in the air, a sharp contrast to the warehouse floor awash in a sea of black ties and ball gowns.

The crowd was there to hear Count Basie and his orchestra headline a concert that would run until sunrise the next day. The makeshift dance hall seethed with anticipation under the glow of industrial lighting.

The pervading buzz of conversation slowed to a murmur as Count Basie took the stage before erupting into a jovial roar at the first note from the orchestra. The annual June German in Rocky Mount was underway.

For much of the 20th century June Germans were an institution in Rocky Mount and the epitome of Southern pomp and circumstance. Hosted by the Carolina Cotillion Club, the party began late in the evening with revelers gathering by the thousands in tobacco warehouses downtown Rocky Mount for a night of dancing, celebration and fellowship that would go until sunrise the next day.

Celebrities, musicians, politicians and the like would make the annual pilgrimage to Rocky Mount to be a part of the event, along with thousands of participants and spectators.

Teams of locals worked tirelessly in the days leading up the event, setting up elaborate décor, banquet tables and stages, transforming the old industrial utilitarian structure into a Southern vision.

Bands would begin playing late in the evening on Friday nights. Throughout the evening three intermission parties would take place. Participants would venture out into the neighborhood to local resident’s homes for a brief respite with food and drinks provided by the hosts.

The dances typically ended at 5:00am and in those early morning hours the following Saturday, droves of visiting party goers would make their way to the Atlantic Coast Railway or bus station in their disheveled tuxedos and gowns for the journey home. Rocky Mount locals would meet up at their favorite breakfast spots to debrief on the night’s events. Reportedly, some would venture over to Benvenue Country Club for an early morning swim.

And while similar towns across Eastern North Carolina also hosted June Germans, those hosted in Rocky Mount were by far the premier events. As evidenced by the media attention that surrounded the events through the decades, it was not just a regionally recognized affair but one of national repute.

According to a 1937 profile in Life Magazine titled, “Life Goes to a Party”, “Every June since 1880, the Carolina Cotillion Club has given a German which provides fun and frolic for thousands of Carolinians, makes the thriving tobacco town of Rocky Mount, N.C. a cynosure for invited guests from many another State.”

In 1941, the Saturday Evening Post featured an article by Jonathan Daniels on the Rocky Mount dances titled “Tobacco Dance”. In it, Daniels described the cultural magnitude of the event writing that, “10,000 people are often formally invited by the little Carolina Cotillion Club to dance and watch dancing, and that enough come to make their June German the biggest annual dance in the South, perhaps in America, maybe in the world.”

The origins of the June Germans go all the way back to the 1870s. While there are conflicting reports on the origin of the “June German” title, most reportedly agree the name had little to do with the country of Germany. It was more likely a result of a popular dance at the time called the “German”.

According to a 2014 piece in Our State Magazine titled, “Dance Till Dawn”, the history of the event dates back to September of 1870 when Rocky Mount hosted a “Grand Celebration Ball”, the success of which was so renowned it became an annual event. It was hosted by the Carolina Cotillion Club, and in 1903 was moved to June and officially took the title of the “June German”.

From 1903 on, the event and the city of Rocky Mount quickly gained national notoriety for the sheer size of the crowds and the countless number of famous musical acts that would headline the dances.

This national acclaim led to an annual influx of visitors from all over the country. As reported by Our State Magazine, at the time, “It was one of the biggest things going in the eastern United States. There would be people coming from all over – from California, New York, Washington, D.C.”

The dances became so popular people who could not afford tickets to participate in the dance itself would come to spectate. Thousands would often be seated on the lawn and surrounding streets, a space that became an event unto its own. Local vendors would set up outside of the venue days in advance to secure a space, providing refreshments and selling local goods to the spectators outside. Speakers would transmit the music outside, making for an almost carnival-like atmosphere.

It is important to point out the event’s lifespan ran almost parallel to the timeline of oppression and segregation of the Jim Crow South era. For roughly the first three decades of the dance’s history, it was solely a celebration for elite white society in Eastern North Carolina.

However, that all changed in 1917 when the African American Elks Lodge of Rocky Mount began hosting its own June German. The African American June German would take place the following Monday night. Promoters would lease the warehouse and decorations used for the Friday night dance from the Carolina Cotillion Club.

Over the following decades the African American June Germans in Rocky Mount reached levels of national notoriety and attendance that rivaled, and eventually eclipsed, that of the Carolina Cotillion Club’s namesake event. This would eventually lead to the affair reaching its pinnacle in 1949 with the performance of Count Basie drawing a crowd of over 24,000, as noted in the introduction.

Combined, the Rocky Mount June Germans boasted an incredible line up each year of the best musical acts of the time. In addition to Count Basie, notable acts through the years included Louis Armstong, Buddy Johnson, as well as Rocky Mount’s own Kay Kyser on several occasions. Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey, Artie Shaw, Roy Eldrige, Billy Eskstein and Ella Fitgerald also headlined Germans in Rocky Mount through the years.

As the 20th century wore on, the event and its popularity began to fade beginning in the 1960s as a result of cultural shifts, economic influences and changing traditions. For instance, the decline in popularity of the “Big Band” era and swing music contributed to reduced interest and attendance. By the 1980s the June Germans had essentially run their course.

There have been attempts to revive the June Germans in Rocky Mount over the years. While some have been successful in their own right, they have not reached the cultural and national significance they once did for the city.

Regardless, the June Germans in Rocky Mount represent a time when the city, albeit racially divided under Jim Crow, achieved national recognition during much of the twentieth century for the success of separate yet related cultural endeavors. Today, with the city increasingly more unified under a common goal of mutual prosperity, the potential for great things to once again be achieved should be endless.

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