The Gaskell Ball - History

History

The Gaskell Ball is named for the British writer Elizabeth Gaskell. The Gaskell Ball originated in 1979, when the troupe playing the Gaskell family at the Charles Dickens Fair decided to hold a ball in her honor. The first ball was held at Mills College, a women's college in Oakland. In proceeding years it was held at the Veterans' Auditorium in Oakland. In the 1990s the ball outgrew the hall and had to be moved to accommodate the 300-500 visitors that now attend. The Christmas Ball is still one of the most popular events.

Read more about this topic:  The Gaskell Ball

Famous quotes containing the word history:

    In history the great moment is, when the savage is just ceasing to be a savage, with all his hairy Pelasgic strength directed on his opening sense of beauty;—and you have Pericles and Phidias,—and not yet passed over into the Corinthian civility. Everything good in nature and in the world is in that moment of transition, when the swarthy juices still flow plentifully from nature, but their astrigency or acridity is got out by ethics and humanity.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    Bias, point of view, fury—are they ... so dangerous and must they be ironed out of history, the hills flattened and the contours leveled? The professors talk ... about passion and point of view in history as a Calvinist talks about sin in the bedroom.
    Catherine Drinker Bowen (1897–1973)

    It is remarkable how closely the history of the apple tree is connected with that of man.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)