My local dancers now tell me that that is not the way it's danced in other places. At my dances I find that some people take it out and put it back but most will work to footprints. Does this match your experience? How should Once Removed Square Thru be danced?
We originally learned Once Removed Square Thru (about 20 years ago!) as "move to footprints". It was equated to doing the call "In Your Block". The traffic pattern for Once Removed Square Thru is also described in this manner in our Ceder Chest definition. I believe that moving to footprints is the correct, smooth way to dance the Once Removed Concept, as it maintains the Once-Removed-ness of the call as much as possible. This is important because when dancers execute the concept properly they are more inclined to not break down when the call is modified in another manner. Unfortunately, many dancers tend to think that the faster you do the call, the better.
Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending upon your point of view), due to the fact that Once Removed is one of the hardest concepts in square dancing (next to Rewind, Progressive, and Magic Interlocked Diamonds), several dancing 'cheats' have evolved in recent years.
I recently added an entry to our FAQ database on different methods ('cheats'?) to dance Once Removed: http://www.ceder.net/faqdb/view.php?section=7&category=31#spot19
