Love Letters is Portland Monthly’s quarterly series from nonfiction comics creator and editor Shay Mirk celebrating the parties and places that shape our city.

Back in 2021, Sean Monaghan and Bailey Salisbury founded a queer line dancing event series in Los Angeles called “Stud Country.” Dancers would boot scoot to Britney Spears and kick ball change to Kesha, dressed in mesh and sequins. The event became so popular, with dancers filming themselves at bars for TikTok videos, that the event went bicoastal, bringing the party to New York. 

But Portland’s own queer country dance party began more than ten years earlier. Stomptown’s LGBTQ+ throwdown involves both line dancing and various forms of partner dancing, including Western two-step and swing. But no one’s harboring resentment over Stud Country’s meteoric rise. “I love that it’s getting more popular, that I can share it with more people,” says Stomptown vice president Zoe Frost. “Bring it on!”