If you haven't a partner, any dance hall will supply you one at a small fee per dance. Or you can easily pick one up, as unescorted ladies are permitted in all the halls, usually at a reduced fee to encourage attendance.
If you can't dance, you will find hundreds of studios in the Classified directory, guaranteeing to teach you in from five to ten lessons.
You will find some of these studios (especially a number in old brownstone houses on the West Side) sell more than dancing instructions. It's up to you to feel your way.
If you're a swing addict, consult the newspaper ads for the places where that kind of band is playing, usually at a hotel grill.
Club bands play mostly rumbas and sambas, with a few fox trots and hardly any waltzes except at the dreamy hour, after 3 A.M.
New Yorkers are not jitterbugs. Most clubs hustle jive addicts off the floor.
TERP TIPS: You dames with wide circumferences should not rumba. If you must, please don't quake below the equator.
Don't shift your right hand up and down her spine while dancing, like a chiropractor or indecisive sax player.... Don't be a floor hog.... Don't grab the girl around the waist, hiking her dress up by inches. (Why not? That's why we sit at ringsides.)
Don't ask the band leader to play a conga unless you want to be spotted as a square-head.
When the band plays a rumba or samba, if you can't do it, remain at your table instead of trying to dance a fox trot to the complicated rhythm. New York is the only city where a large part of the dance program consists of rumbas and sambas. (In the East Side clubs they form the major part.)