KILGORE, Texas -- In a plain brick building in the middle of a sleepy town, in a cluster of rooms that would otherwise be empty, everything sparkles.
There are party dresses and murals so bright that the 1960s would be jealous. Image after image of women in red tops, blue skirts and white boots, belts and hats, throwing their legs up in high kicks. Photos of young college women posing with celebrities and dignitaries -- Prince Charles, George W. Bush, Dwight D. Eisenhower -- clutter the walls. There's enough patriotism in here to make you think George Washington and Patrick Henry combined to decorate the place, then coated it all with red lipstick.
Highlights of performances -- at Cotton Bowls, at presidential inaugurations, at Macy's Thanksgiving Day parades -- are shown on two small televisions. And for visitors who believe the star power cannot be contained to screens the size of a car window, there's a 60-person theater, too.
This is the Rangerette Showcase and Museum in tiny Kilgore, Texas, and it's dedicated to the women credited for being part of the first modern dance team, the Kilgore College Rangerettes.
Founded by Gussie Nell Davis in 1940 and now preparing for its 66th straight performance at the Cotton Bowl, the Rangerettes give Kilgore (population: 15,000) a reason to have a museum. Ask anyone from this east Texas town what their community is known for, and they'll tell you oil and the Rangerettes, and probably not even in that order.
Oil has provided the livelihood for Kilgore, but the Rangerettes are the lifeblood. For 76 years, the Rangerettes, who got their start by creating halftime entertainment at junior college football games, have made the weekends worth working toward. Their halftime shows have done the impossible -- surpassed the appeal of a football game in, of all places, Texas.
Their biggest annual blowout will come Thursday on the AT&T Stadium field at halftime of the Michigan State-Alabama Cotton Bowl. The Rangerettes' performance, which will feature a prop performance with a giant horseshoe this year, has been as much a part of the Cotton Bowl as the actual football. Since October, they have been rehearsing the performance; since 1951, the Rangerettes have performed at the Cotton Bowl. They are just about as "Texas" as Jerry World itself.
But beyond their flashy New Year's Eve performance, within their daily lives, the Rangerettes are a sisterhood, but more athletic. They're a cult without the Kool-Aid. They're an exclusive club in which perfectly curled hair, high kicks, years of dance training, scuffed-up white boots and small-town pride all come together to form a team filled with what the Rangerettes deem "all-American girls." They're part of an entity -- like the ocean or a new car -- that can only be seen in all its forms if you're actually inside of it.
***
"Kick! Kick! Kick!"
"I'm solid gold, I've got the goods, they stand when I walk, through the neighborhoods."
Each lyric of David Naughton's "Makin' It" that's blasting through the Rangerettes' sweltering gym is punctuated with 72 women chanting "Kick! Kick! Kick!" A burst of disco and an instant mood-booster, the 1979 hit song has been used for the Rangerettes' practices basically since it came out. The upbeat groove distracts from the military-like nature of the training going on inside the Kilgore College gym this January day.
Rows of Rangerettes charge forward, arms entwined, steadily kicking their legs past their foreheads to the beat of the music. Bungee cords come to mind as the women kick, kick, kick -- their smiles never wavering as they bounce on their toes and throw their legs toward the rafters.
Kicking is the foundation of what the Rangerettes do, and it's what thousands of fans come to see. Imperfection is not tolerated.
Rangerettes have to develop "kicking muscles" -- a combination of strength, power and flexibility that's simply not built without repetitively throwing their legs as high as they can go, elasticizing hamstrings past the point of normal. Over and over and over again, they kick, kick, kick.
Injuries can be an issue. Said Emily Wendt, a member of the 2013-15 lines: "You can't expect your leg to hit your face every day and not have any repercussions."
"I'm makin' it, I've got the chance, I'm takin' it (kick!), no more, no more, fakin' it (kick!)."
And if they are fakin' it, while Naughton croons in the background, assistant director Shelley Wayne, a former Rangerette, will tell them so. Loudly. The Rangerettes are the Alabama football, the Kentucky basketball, the Yankees of dance teams, and the expectations of perfection match.
"This is ridiculous! We do not kick at waist-level!" Wayne yells from the alcove overlooking the gym floor. "You have a weekend coming up, and I suggest you use that time to figure out how you're going to get your kick endurance up. We do NOT kick at waist-level!"
Getting accustomed to the kick expectations and the athleticism of the organization is what most Rangerettes cite as most difficult. Many have come from high-level high school drill teams throughout Texas, not to mention years of intensive dance training. But nothing is quite like this.
For kick endurance, you can't run. You can't jump. You can't sweat away on the elliptical for three hours. Normal cardio is useless.
"The kick has always been incredibly athletic, and it always will be," said Dana Blair, the Rangerettes' third-ever and current director. "You're using every muscle. Then you're leaping around. You're turning. You're rolling on the ground. This all takes a ton of agility and concentration and power."
"I've got looks, I've got brains, and I'm breakin' these chains (kick!), make some room now."
Looks are important to the Rangerettes organization. Everyone must go through periodical weigh-ins, although no one is bound by the same number. Each one meets with a personal trainer to determine what weight range she should shoot for based off her body type.
"We're fit, young women, not skinny," said Leslie Rowe, a Rangerette from 2013-15. "There's a difference there."
As the Rangerettes prep for their Cotton Bowl performance, their obsession with appearance is on high alert. It's the one day of the year when the Rangerettes trot out in front of a national television audience, and the crowd at AT&T Stadium is the biggest they perform for all year.
"We always joke that you can see the hair on people's legs on that giant JumboTron," said Brooke Luna, the squad's captain. "We really have to watch our smile and watch everything we do and just be aware that we can be on that huge screen at any point."
In addition to their 2-to-3-hour practices five days a week, each Rangerette has to go through two personal training sessions per week, plus three hours of cardio on her own. Part of that regimen is to build endurance; part of it is to maintain the body image the Rangerettes have to convey.
Put simply, being pretty is important. Curled hair is technically a component of the Rangerettes uniform, as well as red lipstick and makeup. Even around campus, Rangerettes aren't allowed to leave their dorm unless they're "put together."
"You don't get to wake up on Saturday morning and be a Rangerette and go out looking like crap," said Lainey Bergen, a member of the 2014-15 line. "You're a Kilgore College Rangerette every single day of your life, from here on, and forever. You want to represent it well. You don't want to be the person to let that tradition fall."
But their distinctive makeup and lipstick can't hide a lack of skill. Talent, above all else, is what the directors say they search for during tryouts. "Hopefuls" aren't allowed to wear makeup during the tryout process. Everyone wears her hair in a ponytail as she sweats away in the stuffy gym. Those regulations are attempts to take looks out of the equation when choosing the team. But once the women are chosen, a naked face is taboo.
Although constantly looking put-together and beautiful is held at a premium within the organization, it might actually take away from their athleticism.
"People don't always appreciate or recognize it as a sport because we make it look easy," Wendt said. "I don't want that to sound cocky. It's just because we're taught to do everything with a smile on our face, and you have to never look like that 20th eight-count of kicks is taxing in any way."
Success is mine, I've got the key, I'm makin' it, sings Naughton.
Up and down the floor, the Rangerettes kick, kick, kick. This routine is the key to everything else, because the kicking has to end before practicing the actual routines can begin. And that's when the real work starts.
Said Blair: "I think the football team would watch us practice and say, 'Yeah, that looks hard.' "
***
It would be safe to say that without the Rangerettes, modern dance teams might not exist. And if not for oil, the Rangerettes themselves might not have formed 76 years ago. Kilgore was an insignificant dot on the map before oil was discovered in the 1930s.
"This was a wild and wily place back then," said Ron McGregor, president of the docent guild at the East Texas Oil Museum, situated a block from the Kilgore College campus.
"It used to be a town of 800 and it grew to 10,000 people overnight. It just exploded."
With that explosion came trouble. Much of the population included the "roughnecks" of the oil industry and few families. Kilgore College was established in 1935 in an effort to bring more families to the town, but at football games, men would often go under the bleachers to drink and fight.
The dean of the college then, Dr. B.E. Masters, wanted to create something that would bring more women to the college, and that would keep fans in their seats during halftime. So he hired Gussie Nell Davis away from Greenville (Texas) High School, where she had started an all-girls' drum and bugle corps. Davis is now a member of several Hall of Fames in Texas and was -- even back then -- known as an innovator.
So began the Rangerettes, a precision drill team that was, at the time, unprecedented. They started performing at halftime of the Kilgore College football games and were an instant sensation.
"It was always a mass exodus at the beginning of the third quarters," said McGregor's co-worker, Dicky Joyner, who was also the Kilgore College mascot in 1976. "Football has always been secondary at football games around here."
Of course, by the 1970s, football had been around for decades. The idea of college dance teams still wasn't widespread, so the Rangerettes were still exciting, making Kilgore distinctive. By 1975, the Houston Contemporary Museum of Art credited Davis with creating a "living art form."
Many say the organization was the beginning of everything from the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders to the Laker girls and college dance teams.
"If you take a picture of a Rangerette from the 1940s and a picture of a pom girl from Oregon in 2014, there's been evolution, but there's definitely a correlation," said Chip Hale, a former Rangerettes manager who directed a documentary narrating 75 years of Rangerettes history called "Sweethearts of the Gridiron."
"And if you think about the first big blowout of a halftime show in the NFL, it was the '87 Super Bowl with Ray Charles. That's what the Rangerettes had been doing since the '40s. You take a billion-dollar industry like the NFL, and it's not like they wouldn't have figured out the value of halftime blowouts. But they had a really good template."
That template included the same fundamentals the Rangerettes hold onto today: the never-ending series of high kicks, the always-popular jump split and the simple, patriotic uniforms.
Seventy-six years have slightly shortened the blue skirts, but otherwise, the uniforms have remained the same. The Rangerettes have incorporated more actual dance concepts (ballet, hip-hop, etc.) into their precision routines, but again, the fundamentals have remained. They've taken their show all over the globe. Previous lines have met John Wayne, Bob Hope and Troy Aikman, to name a few.
"Other dance teams get lost in the inertia that is major college and pro sports," Hale said. "But the Rangerettes stand out on their own. People are standing in line waiting to get pictures with them during football games, because they've come from all over just to see the Rangerettes perform."
Coming to see the Rangerettes is largely why anybody would come to Kilgore, period. Sonic's happy hour draws the young crowd. There are hamburger joints, a movie theater, a 16-lane bowling alley. You have to drive at least 20 minutes to get to a mall. And it's not uncommon for teenagers to hang out in the Wal-Mart parking lot on weekend nights.
But that doesn't matter for the women wanting to be part of the program. Because if you're a Rangerette, it's rare you have time to do anything but maintain the tradition of the organization anyway.
"It's just such an iconic place to continue dance education," said Megan DeHoyos, a former Rangerette who works at the Rangerettes museum. "This was the beginning of it all. You want to be a part of something like that."
***
DeHoyos is leading the way to the Rangerettes' gym on a bright day in Kilgore; the east Texas sun is borderline scorching.
She starts to cut across the grass but hesitates and sticks to the sidewalk. Rangerettes, of course, aren't allowed to walk on the grass around campus. There are sidewalks for a reason, they say, and cutting corners is a no-no.
The no-grass rule is just one of many that Rangerettes live by. According to Emily Diehl, the 2014-15 captain, Blair and essentially any Rangerette -- current or former -- the rules have their reasons. Those reasons vary, but they all come back to the same overarching one: A Rangerette must be a lady. And it takes a lot of rules to make a "lady" and to preserve the Rangerettes' image.
During practices, freshmen aren't allowed to speak. The idea is to instill in them an ability to listen. "Your freshman year is really for learning and soaking everything in from the sophomores and directors," Diehl said.
Once freshmen move on to their sophomore years, they can speak, but limitedly. When the directors give instructions or criticism, Rangerettes have to respond with "Yes, ma'am, thank you."
"That's really the big one that outsiders say, like, 'Why do you say that?'" Bergen said. "When we say 'Yes ma'am, thank you,' we take that criticism and apply it to ourselves. Then we're thanking them for giving us their time."
Regardless of class, all Rangerettes have to raise their hands when the directors speak.
And that just covers practice.
No matter where a Rangerette might be going -- to the gym, down the street to pick up food, or an 8 a.m. class -- she isn't allowed to leave the dorm without makeup. Or with wet hair. When Rangerettes shower, they have to commit to as much time as it takes to blow dry and fix their hair.
That hair has to meet a length requirement as well: three inches above the belt when it's straight, and touching the shoulders when it's curled.
"We pride ourselves on looking a certain way and acting a certain way, so if we're in public, usually people know us by our behavior or by our looks," Bergen said. "That sounds really pretentious, but [it's] just the way we carry ourselves. You're supposed to be presentable at all times."
The Rangerettes portray a narrow image of beauty, especially when the program's diversity is evaluated alongside it. Its first African-American member joined the squad in 1973, and its first black officer joined the fold in 2012.
There is one African-American, one Indian-American and five Hispanic performers on the 76th line. And although the numbers are low, both current members and Blair agree that the numbers are representative of the proportion of minorities who try out.
"I think there's a lack of motivation to try out," said Kevelyn Jones, an African-American on the 2014-15 line. "There were definitely some people who heard I was trying out and said, 'No, they don't take that many black girls,' because that's how it used to be. Now there just still aren't that many [who] try out."
No matter, the Rangerettes have a perception issue: Nearly every piece of their literature depicts white Rangerettes. It's something that Blair says the squad wants to solve: "With as few that try out, the odds are just low," she said. "We'd love to have more diversity."
Regardless of who makes the squad, they all join with the knowledge that how they look is judged -- whether it's via a weight limit, or a reprimand for not wearing enough mascara.
But if being a part of the Rangerettes' bubble of perfection means following a laundry list of rules, getting a rewards card at Sephora and putting much of your social life on hiatus, then so be it.
"We set the bar and we can't let that fall," said Beverly Tallent, a 1960s Rangerette. "We're the example. If other groups want to imitate us, that's flattering. But some of them have done it on a lower scale."
It's all represented by the organization's motto, which dates to Davis' days at the helm: "Beauty knows no pain."
***
We're going to need tissues. Lots and lots of tissues.
A group of "legacies" -- Rangerettes and their alumni family members -- are trying to describe this quirky, but transformative, organization. They've congregated in their gym, nestled in the middle of this quiet junior college campus. The building's brick matches the rest of campus, except for the giant Rangerette painted on the side in her telltale blue skirt, red top, white hat, belt and boots. Forever beaming onto the rest of Kilgore College, the Rangerette mural throws her hands skyward in victory.
The legacies have gathered in the "dungeon," which is lined with lockers and mirrors and filled with plush blue couches. If this is really the dungeon, wait 'til you see the "Taj Mahal." This is the room where many Rangerettes tried on those uniforms for the first time. There have already been buckets of tears shed in here, but on this day, more will come.
Ginger Terry, a Rangerette from the 1980s, hasn't been talking about her experiences long, but the waterworks already have started. Describing her own involvement is one thing. Her years in Kilgore were the best of her life and helped her become the woman she is today. But for Ginger to explain the moment when a piece of her -- her daughter, Ashton -- was initiated into the same circle is overwhelming.
"I probably can't talk," she says. "I'm sorry."
As Ginger gathers herself, Ashton takes over and describes the audition process: Each summer, "hopefuls" come to Kilgore for a grueling week -- often likened to military basic training. About 100 college-aged women congregate in the gym to see what their future will be. Within this sweltering box of toiling emotions that is the Rangerettes' gym, a sign that seems bigger than the Texas sky drops with 36 numbers written on it. If your number is on that sign: elation, and happy tears.
"It was in God's hands, I remember Ashton saying," Ginger Terry says before her voice breaks again. She reaches for the tissue packet that has been passed around the room more than the Sunday collection plate.
"It was all left in God's hands, and when the sign dropped, it was an unreal moment," she said.
Dabbing at her eyes, Ginger tries to preserve her perfect makeup. Beside her, Ashton's perfectly curled blonde hair bounces as she nods. It was raining on the day the sign dropped, but nothing could have dampened the little halo of joy encircling the Terry family.
Ginger looks around the room. The expression in her eyes is one of comfort and familiarity; she's back at the foundation of the "best years" of her life. This is her zone. But it's also an expression of nostalgia, and of loss. You're only a Rangerette for two years, after all.
"It's changed a lot, but the traditions and core are still the same when I tried out," she said. "I come back and walk upstairs and I get chills. It's the same feeling as when I became a Rangerette. It's a bond that you can't really explain until you're immersed in it."
Ashton didn't always know she would be a Rangerette. She grew up in Louisiana, but the family often made trips back to Kilgore. Ginger would point out her old dorm on campus and take Ashton to Rangerette shows -- "I fell in love," Ashton said.
"Having a mom as a Rangerette, I pretty much grew up with that instilled in me without even knowing it. I feel like I grew up with the poise of a Rangerette without her even having to tell me. Cross your legs -- little etiquette things I grew up with."
Of course, both Ashton and her mother are crossing their legs. If you can find a Rangerette who doesn't cross her legs, or who doesn't call you 'ma'am' or 'sir,' you should go ahead and buy a lottery ticket -- your chances really are that low.
Like Ginger said, "it's so much more than dance." Being part of the Rangerettes is a lifestyle, and it often sets the trajectory for the rest of the women's lives.
Two seats down from Ginger on the blue couch, Tallent, a 1960s Rangerette, agrees.
"No one else in the family understands," she says. She reaches for a tissue, just like she did when she watched Leslie Rowe, her granddaughter, perform in her first Cotton Bowl halftime show two years ago. The Cotton Bowl is a yearly tradition for the Rangerettes, dating to 1951, so Tallent remembers the exact tangle of emotions Rowe dealt with: nerves, excitement, an overwhelming sense of appreciation for the women who performed before her.
If this all seems dramatic or strange, then you're definitely not part of the Rangerettes' sphere.
***
They call it the Taj Mahal.
The Rangerettes' dorm -- dubbed the Gussie Nell Davis Resident Hall -- is less a "dorm" and more a souped-up sorority house. Rangerettes talk about living in a "bubble." This is the bubble: spotless, well-furnished, spacious, where all 72 Rangerettes live during the school year.
Kathryn Heller Zwick, a former Rangerette, and her husband, Nick, donated $3.5 million to build the dorm. It's currently managed by the Zwicks' company, Zwick Management, but will be handed over to the college in 2016.
Shirley Arredondo is the "dorm mom" giving the tour; she actually lives here, too, in a furnished apartment within the building. She is there to decorate for the holidays, take the girls' temperatures when they're sick and oversee day-to-day operations.
Just to the left of the grand entrance hall is a common area filled with plush couches and enough Rangerettes memorabilia and photos to fill an Olympic-sized pool. It's the kind of perfect living room your grandmother dreamed of, complete with silver candleholders, throw pillows and luxury you can almost smell. Rangerettes aren't even supposed to leave the room without re-fluffing the pillows.
Wide patio doors lead to an enclosed outdoor area that serves as a mini-paradise within the near-year-round Texas heat. There's a grill for the girls' chicken and tilapia. There are lounge chairs for tanning (if the indoor tanning room doesn't get them bronze enough). Wrought-iron tables and chairs surround a trickling fountain.
Back inside, past the common area and kitchen, down the hallway that looks like a five-star hotel, are the bedrooms. Each Rangerette has a roommate, and the two share a room many college students would kill for, plus a private bathroom.
Every room is a little different: Some Rangerettes choose to bunk their beds, others move their desks together. One entire side of each bedroom is covered in a bulletin board-like material that allows roommates to decorate with push pins or tape without messing up the walls. The furniture is spotless, the floors clean, the bathroom counter space orderly.
As she leads the way to the sophomores' study room upstairs, Arredondo turns the corner to find a tiny scrap of white paper littering the floor. She kneels and picks it up, holding it in her hand until a trash can is convenient. There's an expectation of perfection that extends even to the Rangerettes' living space. Perfection, or at least the pursuit of it, is what keeps the Rangerettes' bubble from popping.
According to Barbara "Pill" Harmon, a 1965-67 Rangerette and a former assistant director, that standard was set by Davis. If the women weren't performing the way Davis thought they should, she would tell them to sit down and have a conversation with "Percy" -- short for perseverance.
"If you do something wrong three times," Davis would shout, "you'll never get it right!"
***
From the moment a friend's mother showed her a YouTube video of the Rangerettes, Olivia Thompson was sold on the idea of becoming one.
A student at a Salt Lake City performing arts high school, Thompson took the only jazz class that was offered during her senior year and taught herself the rest of the Rangerettes' routines. She kicked incessantly and made her mother critique her. If she wasn't on stage or in the gym, she was thinking about the Rangerettes, consumed by the idea of putting on that red, white and blue uniform.
On a Tuesday three summers ago, Thompson graduated high school. And on Wednesday, she packed up her car, said goodbye to everything familiar in Utah and drove 26 hours to Kilgore. She hadn't even tried out yet, but something had "sparked" in her, and she couldn't imagine doing anything else. (She made the team).
For many like Thompson, dance consumes them. Dance is a bubble, even within the Kilgore bubble -- a place where nothing matters but the movement. Self-expression and athleticism combine to form a vesicle of comfort, a safety net from the rest of the world.
Being a Rangerette forces a woman to push herself past the point she thought she could reach, to find a version of self-esteem that may have been lacking before.
With her training and 26-hour drive, Thompson had already proven to herself she could do whatever the heck she put her mind to. And once she arrived in Kilgore, her body proved the same. The 110-degree Texas heat got to her on her first day out on the football field during her freshman year. She managed to get out a few words -- "Yes ma'am, thank you, emergency, I think I'm gonna die" -- before she passed out that day.
Instilling heat endurance and general athletic excellence is just one part of the self-confidence Rangerettes gain while they're in Kilgore. To Blair, who was a Rangerette herself before becoming director, drill teams gave her something to be part of when traditional sports just didn't click.
To Teresa Kaelin Shore, whose daughter Catherine was on the 2014-15 line, the benefits of Rangerettes stick with her today -- so much so that she speaks about her involvement in present tense.
"I think it's given me self-confidence and it helps me get to know myself more," she said. "It helps me manage being under pressure. It's helped me with my confidence and communication, just talking to other people."
Catherine has gained that same flair, that same belief in herself -- especially after her first Cotton Bowl performance. As she stared up at an empty AT&T Stadium, where more than 72,000 people would later file in, all Catherine could think about was the fact that this would be the biggest audience she'd ever danced in front of. What if she was the one to mess up?
"I just remember hitting that ending pose," she said, beaming. "I'd been concentrating the whole dance and then I hit the ending pose and I was like, 'I can't believe I just did this.' "
There's something to be said for wanting something or training for something, then going out and fulfilling that effort in the biggest way possible.
The Rangerettes are an organization that is, undoubtedly, a paradox. It represents and chases after the ideal of an all-American girl, when that ideal may not exist in today's society. The vast majority of Rangerettes are still white, regardless of the reasoning. And the program imposes rules and weight limits on women that may seem restricting to outsiders.
But inside this world hidden in rural Texas, all of that takes a backseat to the sense of accomplishment and self-worth each woman attains once she puts on the uniform -- the next link in a chain that goes back to 1940.
"It was just a dream come true to make it," said Rowe, Tallent's granddaughter. Her face crumples and she tries to squeeze the rest of the words out.
"Whenever I did see my number on the sign, I just felt relieved because all my life I had wanted to be a Rangerette, and I had finally become one. Nothing's been the same since."