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Monday 9am - 5pm Tuesday 9am - 5pm Wednesday 9am - 5pm Thursday 9am - 5pm Friday 9am - 5pm Saturday 10am - 3pm

Dreamland Ballroom

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Dreamland Ballroom

Bringing back the Ballroom's history, culture and community to the people of Arkansas through music,

Friends of Dreamland are committed to bringing back the Music, the History, and the Party of the Dreamland Ballroom!

01/11/2025

We think we're coming down with a case of boogie fever.

12/03/2024

Investing in your community is important! Give to the restoration of the Dreamland Ballroom today and be a part of revitalizing a largely lost piece of Arkansas history while helping to reduce urban blight in your city and state. Get your tickets to Dancing into Dreamland 2025, Pave the Way by buying an inscribed brick, or contribute any amount to our general fund.

has become important in reminding us to give to the organizations and causes that we care about.

Thank you to all those that support our mission to celebrate the community of the historic West Ninth Street, share in the legacy of the Dreamland Ballroom, and preserve the original intent of Taborian Hall! https://www.dreamlandballroom.org/

09/06/2024

🎉 Exciting Events at Mosaic Templars this September and October! 🎉

Join us this September as we celebrate the 16th anniversary of the Mosaic Templars Cultural Center (MTCC) and unveil the Top 15 Trailblazers of our second class! 🌟

Then, in October, experience several installments of our Soul Series, featuring programs connected to the Soul of Philanthropy exhibit, which presents stories of generosity among Americans of African descent. 🖤✨ This exhibit is on display until December 3rd!

👉 To learn more, visit our website: mosaictemplarscenter.com or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and X (formerly Twitter)! 📲

04/14/2024

Another issue, another batch of event photos to peruse.

03/29/2024

Construction update - Tins are in!
The construction crew is hard at work installing tin ceiling tiles. Front of house is complete, crown molding is going up now, and tiles under the back balcony to come.

These are replicas of the existing tin tiles. As you can see, we are not removing the old but filling in the gaps with the new. Currently, we do not plan to paint the tiles; we will paint the tin molding to blend. The idea at present is to create a significant distinction between the new and old tiles.
More images of the construction process here: https://www.dreamlandballroom.org/construction-updates

02/29/2024

02/01/2024

Two weeks to go! Dancing into Dreamland is Feb. 17th
Since 2010, Dancing into Dreamland has been the primary fundraising mechanism for the Friends of Dreamland. We use your donations to maintain, improve, and restore the historic Dreamland Ballroom.

If you aren’t familiar with why this place is worth preserving, check out our website for the history of this incredible building and the folks who built and utilized it in its heyday. Even more history can be found in the Temple of Dreams, the book written about Taborian Hall, Dreamland Ballroom, and their relationship to the black community on and around West 9th Street.

The rehabilitation of Dreamland over the last few years has our future looking brighter than ever. Help us maintain the Dream this year at Dancing into Dreamland 2024. Tickets still available!
https://www.dreamlandballroom.org/dancing-into-dreamland-2024-1

01/25/2024

The DID'24 entertainment is full of interesting acts - from ballet to hula hoop! What you can expect on Feb. 17th.

Doors open at 6:45 PM, program starts at 8 PM.

Emcees: Poolboy & Will Trice
Judges: Joey Lauren Adam, Brian Earles, & Christen Burke Pitts

The Dancers:
1st Act Exhibition by Desi Indian Dancers (2023 DID winners!)
Bachata by Avery Wall & Carlos Casasola
Ballet by Allison Stodola Wilson, Lucy Busfield, Reese Hinton, & Randi Renfro
Jazz Duet by Hayley Mitchell & Makenzie Mears
Hot Springe Dance Troupe
**INTERMISSION (15 min)**
2nd Act Exhibition by Rick & Sarah Pinedo (2016 DID winners)
Middle Eastern Dance by Sahnnon Sahr
Cha-Cha by Daniel Felts & Juliet Newman
Hula Hoop Routine by Katie Sunshine & Co.
Ballet Folklorico Quetzalli by Leticia Rena

Keep Dreaming, Matthew McCoy

01/11/2024

Dancing into Dreamland 2024 is only a few weeks away! And we need your help with the silent auction donations. The silent auction is a fun activity for the evening and a great way to raise funds at the event. We always like to have an eclectic mix of items so truly nothing is off the table (within reason lol).

If you have a product or service you would like to promote, the DID crowd is a dedicated group of Little Rock lovers who are eager to support local businesses, artists, and more. Your donation is greatly appreciated!

Contact me, Matthew, at 501.255.5700 or via email [email protected] if you have anything you would like to contribute!

01/10/2024

Check out our website for some updates on the construction. We've moved from floors, back to lights. We've got lots of new photos uploaded here: https://www.dreamlandballroom.org/construction-updates

01/08/2024

Floors are done! With plenty of time for Dancing into Dreamland 2024! Sponsored by Mainstream Technologies 🖥️💻👨‍💻
Tickets are available online (link in bio), check out the Facebook event for more details and regular updates. More info about this historic place, our annual fundraiser, and what we, The Friends of Dreamland, are all about at www.dreamlandballroom.org. 💖
✨We'll see you February 17th on these gorgeous new floors for a fabulous event✨

01/03/2024

Can't stop taking pics of the new floor! 😆💖

12/20/2023

One week and the boards are down on the main floor, starting work on the big, back balcony. Check https://www.dreamlandballroom.org/construction-updates for more photos of the current restoration project!

12/14/2023

It begins! New red oak floors are going down in Dreamland this week! The tin tiles are also going up. Working around each other will certainly pose some challenges for these two crews of handymen but they are laboring away at an impressive speed.

Stay tuned for more updates and make sure you come see them in person this February at Dancing into Dreamland 2024!
https://www.dreamlandballroom.org/construction-updates

Address

800 W 9th Street
Little Rock, AR
72201

Opening Hours

Monday	9am - 5pm
Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm
Saturday	10am - 3pm

Website

http://www.dreamlandballroom.org/

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Dreams Come True...

By Matthew Savage McCoy, Executive Director, Friends of Dreamland as featured in BRAVE Magazine

“The Dreamland Ballroom has been a part of my life for the whole of my life. Kerry McCoy bought the building in 1990, the year I was born.

By the way, my name is Matthew McCoy, I'm the Executive Director of the Friends of Dreamland, an employee of Arkansas Flag and Banner, and middle son to Kerry and Grady McCoy.

Growing up, I took the third-floor ballroom of the Arkansas Flag and Banner building for granted. A big old room. Beautiful? Sure, but ultimately my parents’ work place. The place I spent those incredibly boring days in anyone’s childhood, when school wasn’t in session, your parents still had to go to work, and you had to find some way to entertain yourself. And be quiet about it. Luckily for me and my three other siblings, we had this big, empty, kind of dangerous ballroom to help whittle away those hours that seem to go on forever when one is that young.

For most of my life, I remember the first two floors of the building being intact. I remember people working at desks, having meetings in meeting rooms, long tables dedicated to sewing large flags, screen printers, digital printers, all the hustle-and-bustle of a work place. But the top floor was empty and quiet. The floors were not reliable, the safe spots denoted by colored flag scraps, and the mezzanines held up by two by four "columns" wedged into place.

Around 2009, Kerry decided to take on the renovation of the third floor. Unable to acquire a loan, due to the unmarketable nature of a vacant, borderline decrepit, old room, she founded the non-profit Friends of Dreamland (FOD), dedicated to the restoration of the Dreamland Ballroom. This status made grant funding available and donations possible by other old building buffs like my mom.

However, the ballroom restoration was a bigger task than anyone anticipated. But its potential was even bigger. In 2012, FOD hosted their annual fundraiser, Dancing into Dreamland, in the ballroom for the first time. The previous years' fundraisers had been held at the Little Rock Governor’s Mansion. It didn’t take long for the Board of Directors and Kerry to find one very large problem with hosting any event in the historic space... no elevator.

Not being ADA compliant, the liability that FOD, Arkansas Flag and Banner, and my family assumed every time there was an event in the ballroom, regularly put my parents into near-cardiac arrest. So, eventually, Dancing into Dreamland was the only event we continued to host in this incredible venue.

In February of 2017, I moved back to Little Rock after attending college in Fayetteville, Arkansas and began working at the family flag shop. The ballroom’s condition had improved from when I was in high school. Being slightly more mature, I realized that untapped potential my mother always talked about. I began to familiarize myself with the history of this place and this district of Little Rock, and I was blown away. Like many of the people in the area, I had no idea what a jewel this building was to downtown Little Rock, although I had much less of an excuse— essentially being raised in it.

The Friends of Dreamland was doing a great job slowly restoring and maintaining the space, but the time had come to expedite the process. A friend and fan of our non-profit contacted us in the spring of 2017 about a grant, a grant that had Dreamland written all over it: a Civil Rights Preservation Grant awarded by the National Parks Service. I knew this was my chance. I volunteered to do all the paper work, facilitate meetings, contact contractors to make bids and manage files, anything to make it happen. With the help of an amazing team of people, we applied in October…the day the grant application was due! After that, it was all waiting and hoping.

February came and went with no word from Washington. I put the possibility of being awarded this grant out of my mind. Then, this past March, I received a voicemail on my personal cell phone. A month overdue, it was a call I didn’t anticipate. I listened to the message, eyes widening, as I realized what the woman on the other end was saying: “Congratulations! We are calling on behalf of the National Parks Service to inform you that Friends of Dreamland has been awarded $499,668.00…” I jumped out of my chair and ran down the hall to my mother’s office. Fumbling with my phone to replay the message for her, I put it on speaker and watched her face as it registered with her what the lady was saying. She screamed and jumped out of her chair, ecstatic. A lifetime goal—my lifetime at least— finally realized.”

Construction for the new elevator shaft, as well as HVAC system and restored windows, will begin early in 2019. Keep updated by watching our activity on Facebook and our website. Even after this project, the ballroom is ever needing maintance and updating. Learn how you can support the Friend of Dreamland by visiting https://www.dreamlandballroom.org/pave-the-way/

Partially funded by the African American Civil Rights program of the Historic Preservation Fund, National Park Service, Department of the Interior. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material do not constitute endorsement or necessarily reflect the views of the Department of the Interior or U.S. Government.