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Los Angeles Trade Technical College

Social Relation Founded in 1925, Los Angeles Trade Technical College is the oldest of the campuses that make up the Los Angeles community College District. In 1970, the surrounding South Central and Watts areas were still recovering from the 1965-Watts Riots. The uprising had left a path of destruction that decimated the business and community districts of South Los Angeles. At the start of 1970, Don Campbell, enrolled into Los Angeles Trade Technical College to study commercial art.

HipHop Outcome:

In 1970, as student at Los Angeles Trade Technical College, Don Campbell invented "The Campbelllock." His groundbreaking new dance overtook the dance floors of Los Angeles and quickly spread across the United States. The dance itself consisted of momentarily freezing or "locking." The dance also features upper body movements and comical phases between moves. Improvisation proved a key component of the new dance, as Campbell recalled, "one time I fell down and improvised that into my dance. Everyone clapped!"

In 1973, Don Campbell would go on to develop The Campbellock Dancers. The colorful dance troupe prided themselves on outrageous fashions like spotted large apple hats, knickers, striped socks, and suspenders. Don and The Campbell Lockers appeared on numerous TV shows such as, The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, Saturday Night Live, What's Happening, and The Oscars. The dance troupe also performed with some of the greatest entertainers of all-time such as: Bill Cosby, Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Roberta Flack, Richard Pryor, and Cheech & Chong. A decade later, internal conflict and pursuit of individual ventures ended the dance troupe. The Campbell Lockers consisted of future television stars, recording artists, and dance choreographers such as, Fred Berry (Rerun of TV's What Happening), Toni Basil (recording artist of No.1 pop hit Mickey), Slim the Robot, Fluky Luke, Greg "Campbellock Jr." Pope, Adolfo "Shabba-Doo" Quinones (Ozone from films Breakin' 1& 2) and Danny Terri (host of 80s TV's Dance Fever).

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