Nearly 40 years ago, in 1985, the City of Seattle passed Ordinance 11237, the Teen Dance Ordinance (TDO)—a law that essentially banned teen dances outside of schools and prohibited anyone under the age of 18 from attending a concert without a chaperone. If images of a tank-top-clad young Kevin Bacon secretly dancing wildly in an abandoned warehouse spring to mind, you’re not far from reality.

Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam attends a Seattle City Council hearing on the Teen Dance Ordinance in 2000.

Photo courtesy of Jonathan Zwickel

The completely misguided TDO was enacted to supposedly “protect” young Seattleites, but instead it led to its own Unbound Era in which teenagers were deprived of places to gather and enjoy their favorite bands. Featuring a disparate cast of characters – famous rock musicians, hip-hop artists, puritanical politicians and school-age misfits looking for ways to listen to music and hang out with their friends – the story of the TDO is long, complicated and at times downright unbelievable.

Beginning of spring Jonathan Zwickel delved deeply into the history and tradition of the TDO and published Let the children danceA KUOW Podcast documentary series that explores politics, culture and activism in Seattle from the mid-1980s to the early 2000s – all related to the law’s introduction and later repeal. Zwickel first heard about Ordinance 11237 in 2007. He had moved to Seattle that year after being moved from The Stranger to head the newspaper’s music department. One of his first assignments was a story about the opening of the Vera Project’s permanent space for all ages on the Seattle Center campus, where he attended the opening party.

“I didn’t know anything about the Vera Project or the TDO,” says Zwickel. He joined the organization’s board in 2016 and is currently board chair. “Back then, I wasn’t even that familiar with the concept of an all-ages music venue. The opening was a huge party, and hundreds of people showed up. The energy in the room was ecstatic, but I didn’t understand why this moment was so important to Seattle. I had to give myself a ‘crash course’ to understand the backstory and why it was such a big deal.”

After a year at The StrangerZwickel was released and landed first on the Seattle NewspaperThen Urban art (full disclosure: Zwickel was one of my editors when I freelanced for the publication), where he stayed for eight years before the magazine folded. During that decade, Zwickel became one of the region’s leading music journalists, and the more he got involved in the creative scene, the more he came across seemingly disparate threads that came together to form the complex story of the TDO.

“It was probably around 2012, and I was working on the liner notes for a Light in the Attic (a local record label) compilation about funk and soul music in Seattle in the ’60s and ’70s,” says Zwickel. “In that research, I learned about the Monastery, a famous nightspot that acted as a lightning rod for attention. It was a popular place to dance to incredible sound systems, with DJs from all over the West Coast, but it was also a refuge and a safe space for young queer people who felt unsafe at home or pressured by parents who disapproved of their lifestyle.”

The Monastery, the legendary nightclub that once stood on the corner of Boren Avenue and Stewart Street. In the podcast, Zwickel interviews George Freeman, who founded the club in 1977.

Photo courtesy of George Freeman

While Zwickel lists many factors that led to the TDO, The monastery is the focus of the beginning of the story. Opened in 1977 by George Freeman — who owns the often brightly lit house with the “Science is God” sign on the west side of Capitol Hill — the nightclub was located in a former church on the corner of Boren Avenue and Stewart Street. With its all-night parties and open-arms policy, the space attracted many “outsiders,” including a flood of teenage runaways. That caught the attention of authorities. By the 1970s, there were some 5,000 youths living on the streets of King County, and in 1985, the city, led by District Attorney Norm Maleng, issued a civil injunction against The Monastery, citing prostitution, underage drinking, and drug use as reasons for closing the establishment. That same year, the city passed the TDO, which, in addition to strict restrictions on all-ages shows, required venues to have two off-duty police officers on site and carry $1 million in liability insurance.

Young people hang out in front of The Bird, Seattle’s first official all-ages punk club.
which opened in the city center in 1978.

Photo courtesy of Jonathan Zwickel

What followed — clandestine shows, the growing popularity of all-ages venues like the Old Redmond Fire House and Ground Zero in the Seattle suburbs, plenty of grassroots activism by bands, their fans and other music-loving Seattleites — is meticulously chronicled in the podcast, which spans seven episodes. (A bonus episode featuring a live recording of a recent roundtable between Zwickel, Ben Gibbard and curator/promoter Lori LeFavor of Easy Street Records is scheduled to be released later this month.) Zwickel says he had originally planned to pitch the idea as a long magazine article, but as he continued to research and dig, more and more archival audio and video footage began to surface.

“As more and more of this ephemera surfaced, I realized that a magazine article wasn’t the best way to tell the story,” he says. “Instead, I thought about compiling all the bits and pieces I found online into a podcast. So many of the main characters are still alive and can tell the story in their own words.”

Not to mention the music. Zwickel spoke with more than a dozen people, including George Freeman, musicians Chris Walla, Sean Nelson, Rocky Votolato, Paul Uhlir and King County Creative Economy Director Kate Becker, to name a few, each of whom had a unique experience with the impact of the TDO. In addition to the recorded audio clips Let the children dance features original music by local artists Ryan Devlin and Kim West of Smoky colors And Mega Cat.

While previous attempts to repeal the TDO were unsuccessful, in 2002 the Seattle City Council passed the All-Ages Dance Ordinance, which replaced the TDO, loosened age and safety restrictions, and removed the $1 million insurance requirement for venues. After 17 years, Seattle—a city that had become globally famous in the 1990s with its music scene but excluded many of its supporters—finally allowed anyone to legally enjoy the creative community. But even before the TDO was overthrown, young people in Seattle were finding ways to make, celebrate, and see art. Zwickel expands on this in the podcast, noting that Seattle has always taken a combative, DIY approach to getting things done.

“Part of the surreal aspect of this podcast is how adults and politicians got it so wrong,” he says. “That they said ‘no’ and just expected so many people to obey, as if they could stamp out the impulse to be creative or the impulse to gather around music. You can pass this law, but of course you saw young people finding countless ways to connect with music and with each other.”

Journalist Jonathan Zwickel and his dog Edison. Zwickel, a longtime journalist and music writer, is behind the KUOW podcast Let the Kids Dance.

Photo courtesy of Jonathan Zwickel

Whether at house parties, backyard concerts, or neighborhood street festivals, teenagers found a way to keep music alive, express their ideas, and make their voices heard—all with the same courage, determination, and mindfulness that continue to shape Seattle’s youth culture today.

Let the children dance is available on several streaming services. To access the series or learn more about Zwickel, click here Here.