The First Woman to Wear the Cowboys Cheerleaders Uniform
➡ Vonciel Baker Still Holds the Record for Most Years on the Squad. The Dallas Cowboys had had cheerleaders before 1972, including a group of high schoolers in bobby socks and pleated skirts who yelled “Charge!” However, they didn’t dance. In 1972, the high school girls were replaced with more athletic young women who could perform the new routines in the Texas heat. These talented and innovative performers could not wear traditional cheerleading uniforms, so a new look was needed.
Vonciel grew up in South Dallas, one of five children born to a single mother. Her mom Bertha has a fascinating tale: she lost her own mother to the Spanish flu in 1918, and later worked as a maid in the Texas town of Kilgore before moving to Dallas, where she helped build planes during World War II. After having children, Bertha opened the city’s first licensed Black day care in their home.
As a girl, Vonciel loved to watch those dancing shows on television like Shindig! and Hullabaloo. She would dance in the living room and dance in the bedroom she shared with her sister, and when her bedroom was occupied, she rode her bike to the park and danced there.
Dallas was slow to integrate, and Vonciel went to all-Black high school, where she tried out for cheerleader three times and didn’t make it. She joined ROTC instead. She loved the marching, the discipline, and the uniform. She went to Texas Lutheran University, where she tried out for cheerleader again, and became the first Black cheerleader in the college’s history.
Then in 1972, at the age of twenty, she heard a radio spot on the popular local station KVIL that said the Dallas Cowboys were holding auditions for a new kind of cheerleader. These cheerleaders would be more like dancers. A hundred young women showed up, but only seven burst onto the field that first day in August 1972. Vonciel was one of them.
After nearly half a century, Vonciel still holds the record for longest tenure in the squad’s history. She was on the squad for eight seasons, from 1972 to 1981, with a one-season break to have a son named Kinny. She was one of 7 other cheerleaders also known as “The Originals” during the Inaugural season that defined the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders as we know them today.
From interviews, she didn’t like to talk about her age. Some wondered if it had anything to do with a 1980 Dallas Morning News profile of her with the headline “The Oldest Living Cheerleader” (she was 28). Perhaps that wasn’t the title she wanted to hold.
She has another claim to fame. She was the first cheerleader ever to try on a uniform that would wind up in the Smithsonian.
Her sister Vanessa danced for 7 consecutive seasons and got the honor of receiving her Masters of Science degree on the Cowboys football field during a Cowboys/Broncos game in 1977. Both sisters were show group members where they got to travel the world performing on USO tours. They also made appearances at Super Bowls, graced the covers of magazines and appeared in movies and TV shows representing the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders.
These two sisters paved the way for future Black Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, proving that African American women can also serve as role models and ambassadors representing America’s Sweethearts.