Joan Sawyer was a professional social dancer, demonstrating the newest ballroom steps at private parties and in nightclubs as an example for other dancers.
Sawyer was a feminist social dancer, who believed her work advanced the cause of women's suffrage. "
It seems evident that the spread of the dancing habit has done much for women," she told an interviewer, "for dancing is the best form of exercise, for both the body and the mind."
Also for the suffrage cause, she drove an automobile decorated with suffrage banners across the United States in 1915, stopping along the way to give impromptu dance shows to raise funds for the suffrage movement.

A reviewer in 1915 called Sawyer "as graceful as a summer cloud adrift in a sea of blue."
Among her dance partners were Rudolph Valentino, George Raft, Nigel Barrie, Wallace McCutcheon Jr., and Arthur Ashley.
She danced with Valentino for president Woodrow Wilson.
She was among the dancers who claimed to invent the foxtrot.

She managed a nightclub, the Persian Garden, in New York City in 1914.
The club was unusual in its time, for having a woman manager and a black Jamaican-born band leader, Dan Kildare.
She was also the namesake of the "Joan Waltz", she composed a tango ("The Persian Gardens Tango") and a maxixe ("The Joan Sawyer Maxixe"), she originated the "Aeroplane Waltz", and she published instructions for other dance steps.
She performed on vaudeville, and appeared in one silent film, Love's Law (1917).
Joan Sawyer was a professional social dancer, demonstrating the newest ballroom steps at private parties and in nightclubs as an example for other dancers. Sawyer was a feminist social dancer, who believed her work advanced the cause of women's suffrage. "It seems evident that the spread of the dancing habit has done much for women," she told an interviewer, "for dancing is the best form of exercise, for both the body and the mind." Also for the suffrage cause, she drove an automobile decorated with suffrage banners across the United States in 1915, stopping along the way to give impromptu dance shows to raise funds for the suffrage movement.
A reviewer in 1915 called Sawyer "as graceful as a summer cloud adrift in a sea of blue." Among her dance partners were Rudolph Valentino, George Raft, Nigel Barrie, Wallace McCutcheon Jr., and Arthur Ashley. She danced with Valentino for president Woodrow Wilson. She was among the dancers who claimed to invent the foxtrot.
She managed a nightclub, the Persian Garden, in New York City in 1914. The club was unusual in its time, for having a woman manager and a black Jamaican-born band leader, Dan Kildare. She was also the namesake of the "Joan Waltz", she composed a tango ("The Persian Gardens Tango") and a maxixe ("The Joan Sawyer Maxixe"), she originated the "Aeroplane Waltz", and she published instructions for other dance steps. She performed on vaudeville, and appeared in one silent film, Love's Law (1917).
Joan Sawyer (dancer)