LGBT club provides gender inclusive square dancing in Sacramento County
Nolan Neikirk was skeptical when they were first taken to a square dancing class in downtown Sacramento.
“I was like, ‘Square dancing? Like what you do in fourth grade?’” Neikirk said. “But (former my partner) said to just come and watch.”
Whenever the music came on, people jumped out of their seats and started dancing, Neikirk said. It became so electric that Neikirk said they begged to join a class.
“My jaw was hurting because I just couldn’t stop laughing and smiling,” Neikirk said.
Neikirk is now president of the Capital City Squares, Sacramento County’s LGBTQ+ square dancing club, which hosts classes at the Fruitridge Community Center. For Neikirk, who is genderqueer, the club has become a community.
“Dancing has been something that’s brought us up,” Neikirk said. “Especially in this political climate.”
The club offers a safe space for LGBTQ+ folks across Sacramento County when many feel like their identity is threatened, Neikirk said.
LGBTQ+ hate crimes are at “disturbing, record-breaking numbers,” according to data from the Human Rights Campaign. In 2023, the Federal Bureau of Investigation recorded 2,402 hate incidents allegedly due to a victim’s sexual orientation. The year prior, that number was 469. LGBTQ+ people make up 4.4% of Sacramento’s metropolitan population, according to the University of Los Angeles, School of Law’s Williams Institute.
“We offer a space where trans folk can come and dance and not have to worry about whether there’s any misgendering,” Neikirk said. “There are no people who are refusing to use the wrong pronoun. We offer a space that the LGBTQ community can just be and can bring in their culture.”
Square dancing is typically more conservative and heteronormative with dancing roles being described through gendered terms, Neikirk said. A “gent” in square dancing is traditionally the one leading the dance. To be more accepting of all genders and generally gender-neutral, Capital City Squares uses the terms “larks and robins.”
Since the club’s inception, its membership has grown to more than 100 members.
Capital City Squares started in 1981 at a gay bar located in Arden Arcade. Eventually, the bar closed its doors, and their venue gone, the original dancers of the Capital City Squares remained. They would, and still do, dance in parking lots, community centers, churches, cafeterias, and anywhere they could meet, Neikirk said.
With the opening of the Sacramento club, it’s also became one of the founders of the International Association of Gay and Lesbian Square Dance Clubs, Neikirk said. LGBT square dancing clubs exist in Canada, Japan, Denmark and Australia. Currently, there are 80 square dancing clubs across the country.
In many ways, square dancing has served as a metaphor for the positivity community can bring, Neikirk said. During the dance, when dancers make mistakes, they often stray off to the side. They’re then brought in by others dancing in the center of the square circle. To Neikirk, this routine is symbolic for the LGBT community — that no matter what, everything will be okay because someone has your back.
“In life, we might make mistakes, we might change,” Neikirk said. “But we have to band together, help each other out, and make sure that we get back home and that we’re all okay.”
This story was originally published July 5, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
