A San Clemente Couple Dos-a-Dos Into the Square Dance Hall of Fame

Forty years ago, Eleanor and Norman Paddock began square dancing, and they haven’t stopped since.

For most of that time, “We would be out dancing seven nights a week,” said Norman, 83, who has been married to Eleanor, 80, for 63 years. Now, he said, they square dance about twice a month.

Through the years, they have promoted the merits of square and round dancing. Those efforts recently were recognized when the couple were inducted into the San Diego County Square Dance Hall of Fame.

“It was as big a surprise to me as you can imagine,” Eleanor Paddock said. “I know we’ve been very active in square dancing, but I didn’t expect this.”

Selecting the San Clemente couple was easy, said Mike Woods, Hall of Fame founder and a square dance caller.

“They have done many things involved in square dancing, and I believe in giving credit to people who work hard for square dancing,” Woods said. “That’s what they have been doing all these years.”

He also noted that the Paddocks helped promote the three-day Jamboree by the Sea Square Dance Fiesta held each year in February, which draws 6,000 dancers to San Diego.

The Paddocks belong to Los Caudrados, a square dance club in Orange County that is part of the Palomar Square Dance Assn. of San Diego. They have been president of both groups several times throughout the years.

They were also the only Orange County couple selected for the Hall of Fame.

“Square dancing is friendship and fun,” Norman Paddock said. “That’s the basis of it, and let me tell you, it’s big. Your next-door neighbor may be a square dancer, and you don’t even know it.” Square dancing is popular among adults, “but not so much with kids,” he said, “and that’s too bad, because it’s a kind of activity that creates lifetime friendships and a close bonding.”

It also provides a good environment for young people because drinking is not allowed at square dance sessions.

“First of all, you can’t drink and square dance because you have to keep up with the caller all the time,” he said. “It has nothing to do with being pure. You just can’t do both at the same time.”

The Paddocks were ballroom dancers at an early age and didn’t start square dancing until a neighbor suggested it when they were in their 40s.

“We’ve been square dancing ever since, and it has become the major part of our life,” he said. “Let me tell you this--you not only get a lot of wonderful exercise, but you also make some wonderful friends, you betcha. You meet a very fine class of people. “

And that sometimes extends to other countries. The Paddocks have toured San Clemente del Tuyu in Argentina, San Clemente’s sister city.

“We bring a caller with us and have square and round dances down there,” he said. “Those folks have a lot of fun with us, and we find a whole new group of friends.”

When December rolls around, Susan Bierwirth, 37, hopes to be 48 pounds lighter, and if you tack that to the 112 pounds she has already lost since the end of January, that’s 160 pounds.

And if she does lose those pounds, the Anaheim woman stands a good chance of winning $15,000 in prizes as Dieter of the Year given by Micro, a European weight-loss company that sponsors the national contest.

Last year’s winner lost 105 pounds.

“It’s not the prize,” said Bierwirth, a personnel service recruiter in Anaheim who weighs 168. “I took a long look” in the mirror, “and I didn’t want to be the person I was looking at. I want to look the way I was when I weighed 120 pounds.”

She said the stress of her job contributed to her weight gain.

“When things got rough, I started shoveling in food,” Bierwirth said. “I was a working mother and put in 12 hours a day.”

And she added: “After I reach my goal, I’ll never be fat again.”

Ngocdiep Le of Costa Mesa has been SURFing this summer at--of all the unlikely places--Caltech in Pasadena. It’s hardly a vacation at the beach.

She is a junior and one of 188 undergraduate students doing independent scientific research at the institute in a program called Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships, or SURF for short. Her research project is “Microtubules of Deep-Sea Animals.”