41. Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders Uniform

Rainey Knudson
Feb 26
2 min read

Original Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders uniform, 1973. Image: Smithsonian Institution

It was the bicentennial, 1976, and that January, the country gathered around its video hearth for the first opportunity to celebrate that milestone. Super Bowl X was a hotly contested matchup between the great rivals of the day, the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Dallas Cowboys. The theme was patriotic, everything draped in flags, with the anthem sung by Tom Sullivan, a blind singer-pianist who’d become a minor national inspiration.

And then… my goodness. Wow. The skimpy uniform had actually been introduced a few years prior, but the entire country hadn’t had its face mashed into repeated views of the hot pants, cropped vest, and high-kicking white boots before. This game originated the term “honey shot” in sports telecasting, as cameramen lingered on the cheerleaders, who managed to come off as both sexy and wholesome at once.

And then Gwenda Swearengin, a former Miss Corsicana runner-up, broke an unspoken rule, looked straight into the camera, and winked.

These were dancers, athletic young women who didn’t do the old cheers-called-into-the-stands. They put on a show that managed to offend both religious conservatives and second-wave feminists alike, while delighting everybody else. In that game, they became “America’s Sweethearts,” and their poster outsold Farrah Fawcett’s that year. 50 years on, the instantly recognizable uniform—now a throwback—sits in the Smithsonian Institution. They were egregiously underpaid, still are, yet many say they’d do it all again for free. And all the contradictions around money and sex, fairness and freedom—all of them are true.

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Special thanks to Christina Rees for suggesting the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders.

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This post is part of The American 250, a series featuring 250 objects made by Americans, located in America, in honor of the country's 250th anniversary. 250 words on 250 works, from January 1 to December 31, 2026.

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