COOPERTON, Okla. (KFOR) – As the last orange of a winter sunset darkens the skies south of Gotebo, OK, north of Roosevelt, OK, and at the foot of the Wichita Mts, the cars keep rolling in to what used to be the bus barn at the old Cooperton School.

It’s been close to 50 years now since Kenneth Boyd and a few other friends put a wood floor over the dirt, hired a band and started dancing.

“Me and my wife, we like to dance,” Boyd, now 95, plainly states

He still smiles when he recalls hiring the first band out of Lawton to come and play and his new venue.

“They said, ‘where is Cooperton? we never heard of it’,” he chuckles.

The crowds kept growing so they kept playing, first on Saturday nights, now every Friday. Old timers calculate this dance is responsible for most of the romances for miles around.

“That met and were married from this place,” claims one of the original organizers. “At one time it was in the sixties.”

“It’s way more than that now,” Kenneth corrects.

Russ Tate might be the bass player for the new house band, but there was a time when he was Sheriff in Kiowa County.

He recalls coming to the dance to ‘press the flesh’ as a candidate, but he never had a call for trouble, not even once.

“We don’t have any drinking going on. No fights,” he says.

2-step, shuffle, a little country waltz, and some polka. Kenneth wishes they’d play a little more polka, but that’s okay.

The little dance, with a supper sandwiched between, is still going strong. The music echoes off the cowboy rocks, and keeps this little spot on the country map.

The Cooperton Dance is every Friday night. Music starts at 7 p.m. The band plays for an hour before supper. They play for 90 minutes after that. Admission is $7.