History

(this story was originally published in The Ocean Hills Observer, Volume XIV, Number 2, June 25, 2017)

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Are you looking for the Fountain of Youth?

Is there a regimen or a way of life that will make you healthier?

Maybe try TAP DANCING!

Twenty-five years ago, Lillian Ashton and Ginny O'Hara formed the Village Tappers, and now, about a million taps later, they are looking and feeling as spry as teenagers heading for Spring Break.

We caught up with this "dynamic duo" at the beautiful, golf-adjacent home of ninety-year-old Ginny O'Hara, who shared some treasured memories with us, about her and her old dance partner, ninety-one-year-old Lillian Ashton.

With a picture of Ginny's late husband, Fred, looking down on us, we made our way through scrapbooks, pictures, memorabilia, and decades of the Village Tappers' worldwide adventures and performances, from Ocean Hills to London, Scotland, Italy, and the four corners of the globe.

Fred O'Hara was equally well known around the campus in his own right. He helped start the Camera Club, the AV department, and kept the golf course handicaps.

The "Tappers" performed at local convalescent homes as well as on campus. Travels took them all over the world, from the Opera House at Sydney, Australia, to a live performance on British TV's "The Big Breakfast."

Clutching their top hats, and trailing countless suitcases of their costume changes, they circled the globe and received "star status" wherever they appeared.

Once, crazy as it seems, they performed on Japan as part of an extravaganza, with dozens of other performers, on a baseball field, between second and third base, in soft dirt, with a faked sound of their tapping provided by an audio engineer. "Originalists" on the Oceanside campus going back thirty-two years, Ginny and Lillian watched Abravanel Hall being built. Their group has gone through many transformations, picking up and loosing members over the years.

Even though Ginny and Lillian have "hung-up their taps," the group is still alive and performs now as Village Dancers*, having added Hawaiian, Jazz, and Belly Dancing to their agenda.

For current information on the group contact Phyllis Buvel (760) 705-7432

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* club name is now Ocean Hills Dance Troupe