Dancing Archives - Archive Dances: Exploring Dance Histories at the Radcliffe College Archives [1. Aufl.] 9783839424797

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Thom Hecht Dancing Archives – Archive Dances

Critical Dance Studies edited by Gabriele Brandstetter and Gabriele Klein | Volume 29

Thom Hecht received a Ph.D. in Dance from Texas Woman’s University and held an appointment as Visiting Fellow at Harvard University (2010-2012). His research interests embrace the history of dance in higher education, dance pedagogy, and gender studies.

Thom Hecht

Dancing Archives – Archive Dances Exploring Dance Histories at the Radcliffe College Archives

Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de © 2013 transcript Verlag, Bielefeld

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Cover layout: Kordula Röckenhaus, Bielefeld Cover illustration: Photograph: Dance group at Radcliffe College, 1948. Courtesy of The Schlesinger Library. Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University. Proofread and Typeset by Thom Hecht Printed by Majuskel Medienproduktion GmbH, Wetzlar ISBN 978-3-8376-2479-3

Table of Content

I. I NTRODUCTION Mapping Dancing Archives — Archive Dances | 9 Telling Archive Stories | 9

Moving from Archival Theory to Archive Stories as Research | 13 Radcliffe College: The Coordinate Sister of Harvard University | 15 Narrating Archive Stories from the Radcliffe College Archives | 23

II. CONTEXTUALIZING THE ARCHIVAL DISCOURSE The Paradigm Shift from Practice to Theory | 27 The Scholarship of Archiving | 27 From Archival Practice to Archival Theory | 28 The Digital Turn in Archiving | 35 Digital Archives in the Performing Arts | 43 Preserving and Documenting Dance in America | 47

III. ARCHIVAL STORY -ING AS METHODOLOGY Experiencing the Archival Discourse | 51

First-hand Experiences of the Archival Discourse | 51 Archive Stories from Around the World | 53 More Tales from the Archives | 58 Archive Stories in the Performing Arts | 62 Archival Story-ing as Methodological Framework | 66 Creating, Drawing Upon, and Experiencing Archive Stories | 68

IV. ARCHIVE STORY I The Strongest Girl in Radcliffe | 73

The First Visit to the Radcliffe College Archives | 73 A Chance Encounter: Finding Eleanor Stabler Brooks | 77 How Can I Introduce Eleanor to You? | 81 The First Lead: “Said Mine Would Do” | 84 Eleanor’s Gymnasium Schedule: Advanced-Level Classes | 88 Eleanor’s Gym Suit: Clothing for Physical Education | 91 Eleanor’s Athletic Ambitions: The Strongest Girl in Radcliffe | 96 Eleanor’s Athletic Schedule: Her Father Disapproves | 102 My Ending Dance Alongside Eleanor | 105

V. ARCHIVE STORY II The Teacher Who Danced With Knives | 107 Turning Over a New Leaf | 107 How I Meet Katharine Schroeder | 110

Katharine, Teacher of Dancing at Radcliffe College | 117 Katharine’s Dance Offerings at Radcliffe College | 127 Milestones in Katharine’s Dance Career | 130 Katharine’s Teaching Philosophy | 135 The Pleasure of “Seeing” Katharine | 140 Dancing Between the Clashing Blades | 142

VI. ARCHIVE STORY III From Dancing Elephants and Men at Radcliffe | 145 How Nature is Affecting Scholarship | 145 The Return of the Gym Suit | 150 I Feel Like an Elephant Trying to Dance in Them | 153 Bridging the Archival Gap | 156

Living the Historical Context as an Archival Lead | 163 Connecting to John Holden | 169 Exploring Gender within the History of Harvard-Radcliffe | 172 Coeducational Issues in the Radcliffe Gymnasium | 176 Dancing Together with Elephants and Men | 178

VII. CONCLUSION Expanding the Possibilities of Writing Histories | 183 How Not to End an Archive Story | 183 The Archive as a Living-Site-of-Knowledge | 186 The Archive-Outside-the-Archive | 188 The Archive as Archival History-in-the-Making | 190 Archival Collaborations as the Future of Historical Writing | 193 Post-Scriptum: The Dance After the Ball Ended | 195 Acknowledgements | 197 Works Cited | 199

I. Introduction Mapping Dancing Archives — Archive Dances

The most serious, committed, excellent historical research comes from choosing a subject to which we are personally drawn, whether through family artifacts, a chance encounter, a local news story, or some other fascination that sets us on a trail of discovery, curiosity, and intrigue. (KIRSCH AND ROHAN 8)

T ELLING ARCHIVE S TORIES As long as I can remember—probably since my early childhood when I started reading children’s literature—narratives set in educational settings fascinated me. I almost certainly read more than a dozen times the majority of British children’s writer Enid Blyton’s boarding school series such as Malory Towers and St. Clare’s. In retrospect, educational narratives not only accompanied, but also largely enriched my life over the years by giving me insights into the many ways experiences

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can unfold in a variety of educational settings, even if only in fictional form. Similar to Blyton’s boarding school stories, higher education institutions often became the setting for popular fiction with many plots unfolding within Harvard University’s Gothic architecture in which writers could create academic scenarios that fed the audience’s imaginations. Today, these academic narratives are fictionalized in popular series like J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter in which Harry’s first glance at the world of witchcraft takes place at Hogwarts’ dining hall, a hall with a strong resemblance to Harvard’s Annenberg Hall modeled on prestigious academic institutions in Britain. Other popularized fiction set within the academic environment of Harvard University include William Martin’s Harvard Yard, Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons, as well as Amanda Cross’s Death in a Tenured Position, to name only a few. I remember that I was fascinated by Cross’s novel—a female murder mystery at Harvard University—although at the time of reading the novel, I knew little about the struggle of women to succeed in institutions of higher education. On the backcover of Death in a Tenured Position, Cross summarizes the fate of her female character, Janet Mandelbaum, by narrating: It’s only because Janet Mandelbaum is no feminist that the stuffy old boys of Harvard agree to make her the first woman professor in the English department. But they’re not happy about it. At a sedate and proper afternoon tea, someone slips a mickey into Janet’s Campari and she’s found by the police in a compromising position—drunk on the floor in the ladies’ room. That’s when sophisticated sleuth Kate Fansler shows up to help her old friend figure out who’s after her. But before she does, Janet is found dead—this time in the men’s room. (Cross, back cover)

A few years ago, when I read the blurb concerning Cross’s publication, I had no idea that one day I would spend a couple of years conducting archival research at the Radcliffe College Archives, housed in Harvard

I NTRODUCTION | 11

University’s Schlesinger Library, in order to partially fulfill my Ph.D. in Dance with a doctoral minor in Women’s Studies at Texas Woman’s University. I would have been even more surprised if I had known that I would use dance as an inroad to explore and narrate my archival journey at the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) with the aim to shed light on the process of archival research. Like many scholars and fiction writers who became interested in exploring the history of women’s lives within American educational institutions, I was also drawn to investigate the barriers erected to keep these women’s lives separate from their male counterparts who were in the midst of defining traditions within American academic settings. This specifically gendered interest began to emerge when I took a graduate class in “Feminist Pedagogies” in partial fulfillment of my doctoral minor in Women’s Studies. During the following semester after completing the “Feminist Pedagogies” class, I continued to follow my new interests by enrolling in “History of Higher Education,” a graduate course at the University of North Texas. During this class, I explored in more depth how women in American higher education struggled to find a place within a traditionally male academic environment. These studies led me to research more closely the history of dance at Radcliffe College, a school that was initiated to teach only women, but then continued to undergo many historical changes as it became intertwined with the male students and faculty of Harvard University. Initially, I searched for primary sources by contacting the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) via E-mail. While the librarian at RCA informed me that they were not aware of any publications concerning the history of dance at Radcliffe, she suggested that I browse through their digitized materials of the Radcliffe College reports in order to discover any primary resources that might shed light on my dance interests. While the digital collection allowed me to get a chronological sense of the development of dance education at Radcliffe College, I felt that I only uncovered the tip of the “archival iceberg.” However, later in my studies after taking a doctoral research methods class, I was able to de-

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velop a knowledge of and strong interest in archival methodology. At this point in my educational journey, my research interests began to shift from narrating educational history to learning about the issues and possibilities emerging within the field of archival story-ing. While I was still captivated by the histories and narratives created in academic settings—in particular how scholars find, create, and reconstruct educational histories from source material found in university and college archives—I began to question the importance of archival research within these histories and narratives. This questioning began to shape my future dance history research trajectory. Later in my studies, I discovered Antoinette Burton’s anthology, Archive Stories: Facts, Fictions and The Writing of History, as well as Gesa E. Kirsch and Liz Rohan’s anthology, Beyond the Archives: Research as a Lived Process. The reading of these texts opened exciting insights into how one might search for materials that bring to light new readings of histories. I became intrigued with how narrating my own archival journeys, in which I illuminate the various entries, crossroads, and paths that I came across during actual “dance encounters” in an archive, might also shape how possible historical stories emerge and provide historical spaces for lost voices. At the end of my doctoral coursework at Texas Woman’s University, I learned about the opportunity to apply for a Visiting Fellowship position in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Harvard University. I saw this as a chance to spend an extended period of time at the Radcliffe College Archives allowing me to work with dance as an inroad into my archival journey within the boundaries of a former women’s institution. I was very grateful to Professor Brad Epps, the Chair of the Harvard University’s Committee on the Studies of Women, Gender and Sexuality, when he accepted my fellowship application to pursue research. In August 2010, I relocated to Cambridge, Massachusetts and my exciting, two-year archival journey as a Visiting Fellow at Harvard University began.

I NTRODUCTION | 13

M OVING FROM ARCHIVAL T HEORY ARCHIVE S TORIES AS R ESEARCH

TO

Now, after being on the archival journey for two years, I am able to create a contextual framework of archival story-ing and lay down the roadmap of my research in the Radcliffe College Archives. In this introductory chapter, the reader will discover the tenets developing within the academic discipline of current archival process. Further, in this chapter I also shed light on the development of Radcliffe College giving primary attention to the historical landmarks that shaped Harvard University’s sister college. In chapter II, “Contextualizing the Archival Discourse: The Paradigm Shift from Practice to Theory,” I begin with a critical review of the historical developments in the practice of archiving and the resulting archival discourse and theory emerging from these practices. Chapter II continues to delve into the extant literature of the historical development of archives by looking closely at the twentieth century key debates in European and North American archival traditions specifically those relevant to my research process. The chapter continues with an in-depth questioning of the role of archival records in the practice of both recording and shaping history. In particular, it investigates specific examples of digital archives relating to performance disciplines and those examples illuminating current theoretical frameworks relevant to the development of dance documentation and preservation in North America. Chapter II further forms the theoretical base for my research process in which the discovery of archive stories, those that otherwise might remain silent and absent from the historical records, can provide new territory for future historiographies. Thus, the second chapter lays the foundation for the following methodology chapter. The academic discipline of current archival process in chapter II allowed me to set the scene for how I might employ archival story-ing as the impetus for future scholarly research. From these broader ideas of archival practice, I was then able to develop chapter III, “Archival Story-ing as Methodology: Experiencing the Archival Discourse,” which

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serves as a methodological framework to narrate my own scholarly process of conducting archival research. Chapter III begins with an exploration of Antoinette Burton’s methodological approach to “archive stories” in which the “story-ing” of archival processes elucidates the researcher’s actual encounter with archives and archival sources. The first part of the methodology chapter reviews a series of scholarly archive stories, shedding light on how each can help shape an emerging archival discipline. The second section of the chapter explores how I developed my own methodological approach to an archival journey in the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) at Harvard University’s Schlesinger Library (SL). This methodological chapter emphasizes how archive stories are created and sets the foundation for how I connected my physical experiences of the environment—both inside and outside the actual archives—with the collected source material found at the RCA. These connected experiences gave me profound insights into what it means to walk in the footsteps of Radcliffe’s dance history. My goal for this research then is to bring my archival process to life and to have the readers sense that they, too, are taking their own walk within the stories created from the archival data explored. Since the historical context of my archival research is embedded in the development of dance at Radcliffe College, I consider it vital to offer a brief chronology of that history. However, rather than providing an in-depth description of Radcliffe’s history—a project that could certainly fill several volumes—the main goal of the following introductory section is to highlight historical landmarks in an attempt to provide contextual frameworks in which my archive stories can be situated.

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R ADCLIFFE C OLLEGE : T HE OF H ARVARD U NIVERSITY

C OORDINATE S ISTER

In 1879 the “Harvard Annex,” led by the visionary Elizabeth Cary Agassiz, emerged from the Society for the Instruction of Collegiate Women after prolonged efforts to make a Harvard education accessible to female students. Fifteen years later, in 1894, the Annex was officially chartered as Radcliffe College by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and was designated as Harvard’s “academic sister.” In spite of the general opposition to establish women’s colleges in the late nineteenth century—a resistance that was upheld both from male-dominated colleges and universities as well as from societal views of the late Victoria Era—there was a growing movement of support for institutions of higher education for women. Indeed, the idea of going to college slowly but steadily became an accepted part of women’s education in upper class society in an attempt to align female education with the upbringing of men. Traditionally, all-male institutions such as Harvard, Brown, and Columbia had set up annexes where women would study and take equivalent exams: Radcliffe College was the coordinate of Harvard University, Pembroke College provided an organizational structure to attend Brown University, and Barnard College was affiliated with Columbia University.1 However, despite these affiliations, typically these women’s colleges were physically separated from their male university counterparts. However, a notable feature of these annexes was their high standard of academic programs that compared favorably with men’s institutions of higher education. As Jill K. Conway notes: In the post-Civil War era the source of important kinds of role conflict for women came from the establishment of women’s colleges on the model of male

1

The Harvard Annex admitted its first students in 1879, and both Pembroke and Barnard in 1889.

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elite schools on the East Coast. These women’s colleges provided women with a collective female life and gave them a training for the mind which was not derivative and did not assume a role for women scholars compensatory to that of male students. (Conway 8)

Given the geographical location of the so-called Ivy-League institutions in the Northeastern part of the United States, it is not surprising that their female counterparts—private women’s colleges—were also largely located in the Northeast.2 Of particular significance was the founding of the “Seven Sisters,” the name given to Barnard, Smith, Mount Holyoke, Vassar, Bryn Mawr, Wellesley, and Radcliffe, “because of their parallel to the Ivy-League men’s colleges” (Harwarth, Maline, and DeBra 6). The academic rigor at the “Seven Sisters” closely met the high standards of men’s colleges. In fact, “The Seven Sister colleges are well known for producing some of the nation’s most successful women in diverse fields. At the turn of the century, they were recognized as the leading institutions for elite White women” (Linda M. Perkins 718). Intrinsic to this development was the fact that these seven private, elite Northeastern women’s colleges were educating the daughters of the “most wealthy and socially prominent citizens of the nation” (Perkins 719). It is important to note that, although each of the “Seven Sisters” colleges was founded individually, they all had the common goal of providing superior educational opportunities to women equal to those available to men. Indeed, this coherence among the “Seven Sisters”

2

It is noteworthy that both the quality and cost of women’s colleges varied regionally. As Nancy E. Durbin and Lori Kent observe, “ Southern colleges for women were generally less prestigious and more affordable than were their Northeastern counterparts, such as Radcliffe College in Massachusetts, Vassar College in New York, and Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania”(4).

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was so strong that their educational design became the models for other independent private women’s colleges: “Daughter seminaries” of Mount Holyoke became Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts; Elmira College in Elmira, New York; Mills College in Oakland, California, and Rockford College in Rockford, Illinois. Sarah Lawrence College (Bronxville, New York), Bennington College (Bennington, Vermont), And Scripps College (Claremont, California) shared the same philosophies of the Seven Sisters, and like them, had benefactors who affirmed the need for a broader education for women. The Progressive-era founders of these colleges borrowed ideas from the preceding founders of the Seven Sisters. (Harwarth, Maline, and DeBra 7)

Although the tradition of separate social spheres for men and women was still prevalent during the emergence of private women’s colleges, the classic design of the “Seven Sisters” colleges “created a specific angle of vision” (Lefkowitz Horowitz 319) to which the majority of newly founded colleges were loyal by carefully modeling the academic structure of these institutions. This intention was clearly manifested in the high admission standards and the rigor of the academic programs, despite the fact that “most women who went to college came from social classes that disapproved of gainful employment for women; hence, women who pursued postsecondary education often had no intention of entering the labor force” (Durbin and Kent 1). Indeed, Radcliffe College was created “at the request of a handful of prominent Cambridge families” (Harwarth, Maline, and DeBra 7) to foster not only the academic intellect of their daughters, but to also prepare them for marriage, motherhood, and prominent social roles. The latter goal was emphasized with no significance given to how these young women might use their developing intellects for initiating professional careers within society. Radcliffe College, with its endowment and legal relation to Harvard University, was also academically affiliated with the Ivy-League school in that Harvard faculty, predominantly male, offered Radcliffe women the same course of study taught

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to men at Harvard. However, despite the range of academic offerings available to Radcliffe women, only a small number of students received the certificate of B.A. equivalency. As Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz explains, “Students came largely from Massachusetts, more frequently to take special courses than a regular undergraduate program” (103). Thus, in its early years, Radcliffe College offered the intellectual atmosphere of a higher education provided through the systematic training under Harvard professors, but it did not offer a residential life for its young women students. In fact, an early Radcliffe report from the late nineteenth century states that, “Our students are scattered by twos and threes in Cambridge families, their lodgings being chosen for them by their friends, or by the ladies of our Executive Committee” (as quoted in Lefkowitz Horowitz 102). In the late 1890s, however, Radcliffe, like other early women's colleges, did nurture a growing college culture and community—separate yet parallel to Harvard—in which female students could participate in athletics, theater, and dance. This emerging college culture involved extracurricular activities which allowed the female students to continually develop a sense of who they were as members of an academic institution. At the turn into the twentieth century, Radcliffe’s academic and residential life slowly started to blossom by “acquiring and building administrative and academic structures and finally dormitories” (Lefkowitz Horowitz 95).3 The emergence of college buildings changed the course of Radcliffe by making it physically visible to the public. As Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz puts it, “The Radcliffe Yard and its residential quadrangle provide the texts that tell the tale” (238). The

3

Bertram Hall, Radcliffe’s first dormitory, opened in 1901. The location was at the southwestern edge of the Homestead, a few walking minutes away from the Radcliffe Yard. In 1907, an increasing dormitory demand led to the construction of Kimball Hall, an identical building adjoining Bertram. The early twentieth architectural trend of achieving a symmetrical composition led to the design of Whitman hall, later joined by Barnard and Le Baron R. Briggs Halls, which completed the residential quadrangle.

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new buildings confirmed Radcliffe’s existence, and with its visible presence—in close proximity to Harvard Yard—Radcliffe also began to establish a college life. In 1898, a gymnasium was designed with a large second floor designated for indoor athletics to include a walking track with a swimming pool built in the basement. The student union building, called the Elizabeth Cary Agassiz House, housed a lunch room, a large living room, an auditorium, and several club rooms providing a meeting space for college activities. In 1906, the construction of the Radcliffe Library completed the “Quadrangle” design, thus developing a harmony “with the gymnasium and the joined Agassiz in a colonnade” (Lefkowitz Horowitz 244-5). These buildings established the basic quadrangle shape giving Radcliffe College its characteristic charm and a seemingly independent women’s college.4 “Radcliffe students took courses, performed laboratory work, studied, practiced, met, rehearsed, had lunch, and relaxed in the academic quadrangle, the Radcliffe Yard” (Lefkowitz Horowitz 247). Indeed, the creation of the Radcliffe Yard helped to transform Radcliffe from an academic annex into a full-fledged college, reflecting the typical campus architecture of an early twentieth-century private women’s college. In 1943, towards the end of World War II, Harvard and Radcliffe signed an agreement that allowed women students into Harvard classrooms for the very first time, leading to a permanent joint instruction from 1947 onwards. This co-educational environment is noted as being frightening to the Radcliffe administration as “such an arrangement would eliminate Radcliffe’s individuality, and ultimately its entire raison d’être” (Mandel 215). However, historians also emphasize that many Radcliffe leaders argued that Radcliffe as an institution was more necessary than ever within the shared atmosphere, “because it provided a space for women to nurture their separate identity within a mixed-sex environment” (Mandel 215). The latter argument became prominent and further promoted the full merger of academic classes.

4

It is noteworthy that it was not until the 1930s, with the erection of Byerly and Longfellow Halls, that Radcliffe Yard achieved its final shape.

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However, this arrangement was also seen to create an equal-butseparate system in which Radcliffe students were literally silenced at Harvard. For example, Andrew K. Mandel notes that “assigned seating arrangements for men prevented women from sitting just anywhere” (216), a situation that can only be described as “slightly coeducational,” as one dean put it (as quoted in Mandel 217).5 Harvard also announced that women students would not be permitted to enter the newly constructed Lamont Library, which had opened in 1949. This exclusionary incident led to the creation of a song by the Radcliffe students in which they basically show these administrative boundaries as creating a loss for the Harvard men: the men lose out on having the pleasure of the young women’s company. The song mocks the separation by claiming: Tech men take us dancing in Boston Dartmouth takes us to ski in Vermont Yalies will wine us and Princeton men dine us So who wants to get into Lamont.6 (quoted in Mandel 219)

A slightly more balanced college life between Harvard University and Radcliffe College was achieved in 1957 when both agreed to allow joint extracurricular activities. This agreement can be viewed as a social merger, in which female students were—at least at a social level— seemingly fully integrated into the college life at Harvard. However, despite this social merger, there was still an overpowering discrepancy at many levels as Radcliffe women were not always able to secure membership in a merged student club—excused as due to limited places available—and rarely were the young women able to run for office in a club. Even though the 1950s were considered a period of “togetherness” between Harvard and Radcliffe (Mandel 224), there was still a

5

Usually, the last rows of seats were reserved for female students.

6

The song was set to the tune of South Pacific’s I’m in Love with a Wonderful Guy.

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strong separatist sentiment in which female students continuously struggled to secure an equal place at Harvard. However, as Andrew K. Mandel observes, “The integrationists prevailed at Radcliffe—until the rise of activism reminded women that they were being treated as inferiors and convinced them that things did not need to stay that way” (Mandel 224). Consequently, during the following two decades, the Harvard-Radcliffe community transformed— slowly but steadily—into a coeducational environment in which the once-exclusive Harvard community opened up to Radcliffe women. In 1963, the Harvard’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences began to admit women students while, at the same time, the Radcliffe Graduate School closed its doors. In 1970, the first joint Harvard and Radcliffe commencement was held in Harvard Yard and the first co-residential housing at Harvard opened in 1971. Finally, in 1975, the limit on the number of women undergraduates admitted to Harvard was abolished. This drive for equality in educational opportunity was not only noticeable at Harvard-Radcliffe, but also can be seen to reflect the social and legal advances made by women in the United States between the 1960s and 1970s. It is noteworthy that only two of the “Seven Sisters,” Radcliffe College and Vassar College, eventually transitioned to coeducation, a process that did not come without problems.7 Beginning with the first merger discussions in 1963—a lengthy process that stretched out until 1972—Radcliffe College was the first of the “Seven Sisters” to start the merger with its male counterpart. However, the struggle toward integration did cause many issues as existing Radcliffe programs were put on a temporary hold. Due to the ongoing “merger-non-merger discussion” at Harvard-Radcliffe, the years between 1967 and 1972 were considered as “frustrating years for college administrators, faculty and trustees and also for students” (Radcliffe College: Report of the Presi-

7

Vassar College declined an offer to merge with Yale University, but instead decided to become coeducational in 1969, whereas the remaining five colleges of the “Seven Sisters” decided against coeducation.

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dent. 1967-1972 4), leaving very limited opportunities to “evaluate existing programs or plan for future needs” (4). Indeed, Radcliffe’s adjacent relation with Harvard was sustained until 1977 when a formal merger agreement was finally signed and women were officially granted diplomas from Harvard-Radcliffe. However, during this “non-merger merger” period women were still regarded as marginal to campus life, leading both faculty and students to be frustrated. For example, Marie Hicks notes that, “when women took up residence in all of the Harvard Houses (but not in the freshmen housing in picturesque Harvard Yard), they were outnumbered in some Houses seven to one” (260). However, at the same time “Harvard’s long coexistence with Radcliffe made it difficult to summarily dismiss women as alien beings in the Harvard world” (Keller and Keller 277). Although Radcliffe was still considered a college of its own, from the late 1970s onwards the male-dominated Harvard administration was “officially” in the company of women, as Harvard University became a coeducational institution. The second and final step in the merger agreement occurred in 1999 and constituted an official merger of Radcliffe College with Harvard University, and eventually Radcliffe was absorbed by Harvard. The completion of the merger transformed Radcliffe College into the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, while female undergraduates were henceforward students only of Harvard College. The Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study hosts the Schlesinger Library (SL) representing the “world’s leading archive of the history of individual women and women’s organizations” (www.radcliffe.edu). As one of largest repositories of manuscripts and archives in relation to the history of women, it holds more than 3,000 unique manuscript collections, 95,000 printed volumes, and approximately 100,000 photographs, as well as thousands of items of ephemera—including the Radcliffe Col-

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lege Archives—where I conducted most of my archival research and created three archive stories.8

N ARRATING ARCHIVE S TORIES FROM THE R ADCLIFFE C OLLEGE ARCHIVES Keeping in view the history of Radcliffe College allowed me to place the archive stories into a historical perspective and in connection with the underlying issues of women in higher education. However, the archive stories that I created (chapter IV, V, and VI) aim to shed light on processes for conducting archival research in the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) at Harvard University’s Schlesinger Library (SL); it does not presume to undertake an in-depth historical study of the development of dance at Radcliffe College. Rather, the narratives found within the following data chapters illuminate the various entries, crossroads, and paths that I came across as an archival researcher during my actual “dance encounters” at the RCA. Each archive story is a narration of my process of conducting research at the RCA with the stories having clear beginning and ending points that highlight a clear chronology of events. Further, each story connects one to another, all clearly telling the reader how choices about the shaping of my narration determine specific pictures of the dance material sourced at the RCA. Indeed, in chapter IV, V, and VI, I show how archival choices made shape each archive story, and how these differing narratives open possibilities for how future historians might approach source materials within the RCA. Chapter IV, “Archive Story I: The Strongest Girl in Radcliffe,” focuses on my encounter with the archival material of Eleanor Stabler Brooks, a student at Radcliffe College in the early 1910s. Although my reading of the source material begins with Eleanor’s dance experience

8

With the focus of this research primarily on the first sixty years of the twentieth century, the summary of historical developments at HarvardRadcliffe past the 1960s is held relatively short.

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at Radcliffe College, her interest in athletic activities leads me to a rich collection of materials that, even though not directly related to dance, helps me gain a sense of one female student struggling to define how her body might move and be challenged to compete in the early part of the twentieth century. Exploring Eleanor’s source material guides me in directions that I cannot investigate in-depth given the focus of this research. Instead, my narration presents a search for dance materials, a search that can guide future historians into myriad and possible histories unfolding within the telling of Eleanor’s physical activities. For example, I explore archival material shedding light on Eleanor’s gymnasium schedule, reflect on the implications of wearing a gym suit, and gain insights into her athletic achievements that celebrated Eleanor as “the strongest girl in Radcliffe College,” while I also learn about her father’s disapproval of Eleanor’s athletic ambitions. Even though the archival paths I take may not specifically reflect a history of dance, they do shape an archive story which can open dance history to differing views about how the female body was being experienced at this time. It illuminates ideas of how young women were beginning to think of themselves as physical beings—as those who could compete, not just for social reasons, but also for the pure joy of physical accomplishments. In chapter V, “Archive Story II: The Teacher Who Danced with Knives,” my archival journey leads me to meet Katharine Schroeder, a teacher of dancing at Radcliffe College during the late 1930s and early 1940s. My quest to get to know Katharine extends my archival journey beyond the walls of the Radcliffe College Archives as I virtually trace geographical points of her dance career. For example, the archive story illuminates her dance training in England; her study trip to Mexico; and her teaching activities in the US Midwest, and East and West coasts. The professional journey I follow unravels and highlights how Katharine’s influences were portrayed by those interacting with her along that path. At the same time, I literally dance in Katharine’s footsteps as I explore what I call “the archive outside the archive” when I discuss my “living experiences” of exploring the local buildings,

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events, and places of dance activities mentioned within the physical archives. This experience of being-on-location, in conjunction with the reading of archival material of dance performances at Radcliffe College during the late 1930s and early 1940s, allows me to illuminate Katharine as an innovative teacher who could engage the talents and interests of students as performers of a new American dance. My academic interest in fashion and costume history as well my personal experiences as a man in dance are driving forces in chapter VI, “Archive Story III: From Dancing Elephants and Men at Radcliffe,” in which I focus on the Radcliffe College gym suit and the male Harvardian entering the female Radcliffian dancing space. The narration begins with a reflection on a “happy accident,” a misfiled source that changes my process by interrupting the chronological order I attempted to sustain throughout my research. This archival source, a news survey that blatantly depicts Radcliffe students’ strong opinions on the gym suit, draws light to fascinating aspects of women’s sports clothing. This further allows me to construct a sense of how Radcliffe students felt about their gym suits in relation to their desire for freedom to move fully and to look good when moving fully. The archival journey then leads me to explore source material about a Radcliffe Dance Group in the late 1950s in which the inclusion of a male student’s name, John “Spike” Holden, as part of the dance group opens possible insights into how men might be joining the Radcliffe culture rather than only concentrating on the dominant conversation about how Radcliffe women were participating in Harvard. In my archive story, I connect with John through my past experiences as a dancer providing me differing insights into what he might have been experiencing as not only a male, but also a male dancer within the Harvard and Radcliffe environment. Chapter VII, “Archival Story-ing: Expanding the Possibilities of Writing Histories,” provides an outlook on the value of archival storying for historical research and the importance of the archival process as a way of opening new readings of and possibilities for historiographies in the future. First, I contemplate how archive stories are dynamic, ev-

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er-evolving narratives, stories that should not end as they have the potential to continually be transformed within differing writings of history. I further argue that archive stories then thrive in the lived experience of the researcher, the personal encounters with the surroundings of the archive, and the interpretation and reading of what is to be found. The chapter concludes by emphasizing the importance of archival story-ing as a research link between the archival scholar and the historian in the twenty-first century as she or he confronts a wealth of source material quickly becoming available in an increasingly complex, digital world.

II. Contextualizing the Archival Discourse The Paradigm Shift from Practice to Theory

T HE S CHOLARSHIP

OF

ARCHIVING

This chapter sets the scene for how the engagement with the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) can be a methodological tool for bringing forward dance education histories that have remained silent and absent from our historical records. An engagement in archival story-ing demands a critical review of historical developments in the practice and theory of archiving, and the archival discourse—archival theory—as an emerging academic discipline. The exploration for this chapter begins with a critical review of the extant literature of the historical development of archives, followed by an in-depth questioning of the role of archival records in the practice of both recording and shaping history. Since the research area for this study is primarily on twentieth century, western developments in archival practice and theory, this chapter will look closely at the key debates in European and North American archival traditions that are relevant for an analysis of the dance holdings at the RCA within this

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timeframe.9 The chapter then continues with a summary of the theoretical discussions emerging from this archival practice. The concluding sections of this chapter serve to lay the foundation for the following methodology chapter by investigating specific examples of digital archives relating to performance disciplines and current theoretical developments of dance documentation in preservation in North America.

F ROM ARCHIVAL P RACTICE

TO

ARCHIVAL T HEORY

To get a better understanding of the emergence of the archival discourse as an institutional academic discipline, it is important to review key developments in the history of physical archives and their collection practices. This historical overview serves as a starting point allowing me to situate the emergence of digital archives within the development of archival theory in the 1990s. The premise undergirding the majority of the theoretical discourse is that preservation constitutes the most important feature of an institution’s archive. In this context, Lisa Hooper further states that, “The interpretation of archives as institution has been long in forming.10 Therefore, institutional archiving has always, since its earliest function, dealt with the storage of informational records” (89), a goal based on the fundamental idea that it is vital to preserve a society’s documents representing its history. The earliest records to which the term “archives” applies refer back to the storage of incoming and outgoing business letters during the Roman and Byzantine empires, a tradition that was soon adopted for preserving medical records as well. Archival records provided an access point to history, albeit only from a very nar-

9

It needs to be acknowledged that there are certainly other archival traditions that are outside of the geographical or linguistic limitations of this review.

10 Hooper explains that “institution” may include government, an individual business or the conglomerate of businesses and educational systems.

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row perspective, as each type of record can only reproduce one aspect of history when analyzed outside of a context. This narrow perspective came to mean that documenting history became increasingly associated with structures of power, in particular institutional structures, whose privilege and power determined archival content as well as archival access. According to Lisa Hooper, “The French Revolution marks the birth of the modern archives” (90), in which the purpose of archives shifts towards the idea of a “centralized archive for the state” (90). During this time, archives were not only recognized as repositories for administrative documents, but also for “documents of social and cultural historical significance” (Hooper 90), launching the introduction of the concept of public accessibility to archived records. Alongside this concept of public accessibility began the systematic organization—a form of indexing—of documents based on chronology, geography, or subject. The establishment of systematic arrangement of documents imposed a historical narrative on the archive by “making apparent relationships between documents and items of particular significance through arrangement and description” (Hooper 91). In adopting this archiving practice of developing systematic relationships, archives explicitly projected the power of the archivist who decided what those relationships might be as well as attaching a particular set of values to the sources. This practice provided its own set of issues, which structured not only a selection of sources that were perceived “worthy,” but also imposed a dominant, pre-arranged form of interpretation on chronological events in history. The archivist then was not only in charge of arranging sources, but also of articulating history through mechanisms of archival exclusion. This manipulation of historical artifacts is the basis for current archivist theorists’ discussions about how the historian’s work was, and continues to be, consequently shaped by archival conditions often beyond his or her control, “conditions such as whether the archivist or librarian is [was] sympathetic or drawn to the project” (Ghosh 27). What emerges from these theoretical discussions is that archives not only represent collections of

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historical documents, but also constitute complex sites of historical knowledge and interests of those archivists who exercised the power to intervene in this historical memory. The practice of systematic archiving is still an essential component in the modern development of the archival discourse and has been outlined by archival historians in three streams: archival discourse published in the late nineteenth century, archival discourse developed between the 1940s and the 1990s, and postmodern archival theory created after the 1990s. In the late nineteenth century, the Dutch trio of Samuel Muller, Johan Feith, and Robert Fruin published their Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives, a publication that articulated the principles used later in early twentieth century archiving. Being the first of its kind, The Dutch Manual had a major influence on the archiving world since it was published in French, German, English, Italian, Portuguese, Chinese, and other translations and was accessed by many emerging archivists. The authors’ chief premise was based on articulating the concepts of provenance and original order in which respecting the original record-keeping systems would illuminate the context in which the archival records were originally created. For example, rather than organizing archival sources in chronological order—as it was commonly done in the past—the Dutch trio insisted that archival arrangements should be in the order they were collected and then filed under the name of donors or related to specific events. In the article “What is Past is Prologue: A History of Archival Ideas since 1898, and the Future Paradigm Shift,” Terry Cook offers an insightful summary of the Dutch Manual: Archives so defined ‘must be kept carefully separate’ and not mixed with the archives of other creators, or placed into artificial arrangements based on chronology, geography, or subject; and the arrangement of such archives ‘must be based on the original organization of the archival collection, which in the main corresponds to the organization of the administrative body that produced it.’ (20-2)

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This principle of preserving provenance and original order was argued to be a vital and necessary element for a sound archival arrangement in which researchers could explore archival sources within their original historical context. The Dutch Manual claimed that it is crucial to reestablish the original filing, classification, and record keeping systems used by the creator to elucidate particular and historical contexts of the materials for archival researchers. Further, it was assumed that practicing archivists were entirely devoted to the arrangement and description of material, thus insulating the role of the archivist as an impartial craftsperson from the role of the historian as a recreator of the past. This “focus, or pattern, has proved resilient” (Duff and Harris 263-4) during the twentieth century, and still exists in the present day, although mid-twentieth century archival thinking challenged the notion that the archivist’s intervention is unrelated to the construction of meaning. Later, from the 1940s through the 1990s, the archival discourse mainly focused on “processes of selection and appraisal, implicitly— and sometimes explicitly—questioning the assumptions informing the traditional streams” (Duff and Harris 264). This new questioning, pioneered by the archivist T.R. Schellenberg, was based in the notion that the archival arrangement and description contribute—at least partially—to the construction of meaning, hence acknowledging the exercise of power created through archival interventions. Indeed, Schellenberg was among the first to recognize the cultural significance of archives (Hooper 91) by widening the methods for which an archives could be appraised and for which possibilities of “historical narrativity” might be considered, thus increasing the points of entry that might identify each document.11

11 The methodology chapter will offer a range of examples, so-called “archive stories,” that illuminate how researchers have found different entry points to archives. My own archive stories in the Radcliffe College Archives are narrated in chapter IV, V, and VI.

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Schellenberg’s definition of “historical narrativity” focused on an in-depth engagement with the myriad complex and overlapping stories that history has to offer rather than restricting archival appraisal to over-reaching, grand narratives—sometimes referred to as metanarratives—such as the Age of Enlightenment, the Industrial Age, or the Dark Ages. Schellenberg, who later became the “father of appraisal theory in the United States” (Cook 10), identified the need for archivists to divide archival records into primary and secondary values. Primary values represented the original value for the creator of the document, whereas secondary values referred to the lasting value that goes beyond the use of the original creator. In particular, Schellenberg put emphasis on the informational value of archival documents in which an archivist should consider uniqueness, form, and importance as selection criteria for inclusion in selected archival categories. In the context of appraising archival records, Schellenberg defined (a) uniqueness as information that cannot be found anywhere else; (b) form as the degree to which information is concentrated in the archival source and how it can be accessed; and (c) importance of the record as its ability to affect a wide range of audiences. Schellenberg’s approach blossomed in the light of an increasing volume of modern records, an era in which it was obviously no longer feasible for any archive to preserve all records.12 The flood of documents produced post-WWII, a time in which “archivists founds themselves limited by poor funding, inadequate staffing, and storage constraints” (Hooper 91), resulted in fundamental reorientation of the archival profession in North America, where the selection of archival material became an essential element of the archival process.

12 For example, Terry Cook explains that “the National Archives in Washington was created in 1934, it inherited an awesome backlog of about one million meters of federal records, with a growth rate of more than sixty thousand meter annually. By 1943, under the expansion of the state to cope with the Great Depression and World War II, that growth rate had reached six hundred thousand meters annually” (10).

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What became the larger issue at stake during this time period is the institutionalization of history authored by archivists, those who created stories through the process of archiving. Archivists made apparent relationships between documents and items of particular significance through arrangement, classification, and detailed description. Although it is reasonable to suggest that this practice of selection and appraisal gave archivists and institutions the power to shape history, one must recognize that the traditional rules of arrangement and description set forth in the Dutch Manual remained largely in place until the 1990s. As Elisabeth Kaplan notes, “Archival thinking remained relatively isolated from the larger academic discourse, out of touch with larger discussions about the epistemology of archives” (216), a practice that clearly separated the roles of archivists and historians. While the archivist was considered a passive organizer of the historical events, the historian was recognized as the active interpreter of the past. Although to traditionalists, recognizing archivists as co-creators of historical records was considered controversial, the scholarship of archival theory—in which the archivist is recognized as a shaper of history—slowly emerged. As Elisabeth Kaplan points out: Only since the 1980s have a handful of archivists begun to disturb this calm with a newer, societal-based approach to appraisal/selection, one that accepts the subjectivity of the whole process, as of history itself, and argues for an active, conscious, and self-conscious role for the archivist as co-creator of the historical record, as active shaper of the future’s past, understanding archives as the problematic representation they are, and recognizing and striving to understand the power (and responsibility) that that implies. (216-7)

Since the Dutch Manual was dominant for almost a century, this traditionally prescribed view of the archivist as a passive caretaker of historical records remained apparent, but was increasingly controversial with the advent of digital archives. As archival scholar Terry Cook claimed in 1997, “Arrangement and description will concentrate less on physical record entities and media, and develop instead enriched

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‘value-added’ contextual understandings of the information systems that create records and of related system documentation and computer metadata” (29). The last decade of the twentieth century posed a fundamental challenge to established traditional archival thinking by opening up the formerly narrowly defined archival discourse. Wendy M. Duff and Verne Harris opened the debate around archival descriptions with a range of questions: What do archivists mean by the terms ‘texts’ and ‘context’? Is the context to a record finite in its reach? Does the making of a record, ultimately, have a beginning and an ending? Do archivists participate actively in the construction of a record’s meanings and its significances? Is the notion of the archivist maintaining an exteriority from both processes of records creation and broader societal processes a chimera? Do power relations, with their myriad privileging and exclusions, find expression in archival intervention (or non-intervention)? Does the archivist have a moral obligation to engage the marginalized and excluded voices in records? Is the archivist a storyteller? How do the contingencies of language and narrative shape the work of archival description? Is archival description simply a form of narration? And, in light of all the preceding questions, can there by a meaningful standardization of archival description? (265)

In the twenty-first century, the preceding questions still color the landscape of archival theory by creating a discursive space for archival ideas that goes beyond the mere arrangement and description of material in archival collections. Before I delve more deeply into current developments and examples of archival research, it is vital to shed light on the development of digital archives, as their emergence coincides with the third stream of the archival discourse in the 1990s.

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T HE D IGITAL T URN

IN

ARCHIVING

The adoption and establishment of the Internet as a research tool has led to the recent development of digital archiving at the turn of the millennium. Indeed, a closer look at the landscape of digital archives reveals that open access scholarly sources keep blossoming everywhere in a multi-disciplinary manner. Peter Jasco asserts that: The large scale and intensive implementation of open access scholarly databases, digital archives, depositories and repositories of journal articles, conference papers, research reports, and dissertations on the Web represent the best option for making widely and easily accessible high quality information in a well structured, comprehensively searchable manner. (2)

Given the rather slow-paced historical development of archive collections in the past, the recent advances in information technology brought physical archives quickly into the digital world. Digital archiving also emerged out of the necessity to satisfy the growing reliance on the World Wide Web as a source of information for scholars and the general public, a shift, which contributed greatly to the growing number of digital collections and libraries. “To continue to meet patrons’ needs, librarians must take steps to include Web-published materials in their collections” (Hsieh, Murray, and Hartman 8). Based on this assumption, it is now vital to consider the limitations and further possibilities of investigating primary sources through digital archives as a qualitative research methodology. The possibilities of digital archives include the fast-growing digitization of primary source materials in which the landscape of historical research is broadened by making sources easily accessible and immediately available, manually searchable, and accessible to the researcher from any remote location. Lynda James Gilboe aptly explains that, “[there is a] growing interest in primary source material, an increasing impatience with manual searching, space savings, the need to preserve and archive in multiple formats, and the expectation of researchers are

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driving a need for digital archives” (155). A new generation of historical researchers—tech-savvy and accustomed to immediate access to electronic sources—is driving an expanding need for the creation of digital archives. However, researchers must be aware that digital archivists face several unique digitization challenges and limitations—such as large image sizes, complex formats, to name a few—making it more difficult for the researcher to identify the full scope of the available materials.13 In this context, Lisa Hooper puts forth that, “The practice of selection for digital representations within the archival community is reflective of the changing status of the document, of reproduction, and the authority of the document [and the object]” (94). As such, working with digital archives entails the risk of missing important primary sources that have not yet been digitized. Jacob Nadal’s article “The Human Element in Digital Preservation,” emphasizes “the need for human mediation and decision-making during this early period of digital preservation and development” (289). While digital archiving involves a great deal of automation and technology-driven procedures, there is still a need for human decision-making, intervention, and verification of what goes digital.

13 In this context, it is interesting to question if a reproduced image—the copy of an artifact—can still be considered as a primary source, in particular if the size of the image or other formatting issues change how one views the image compared to a viewing of the original. While it is common practice for researchers to create copies from the artifacts, for example through photographing or photocopying, these copies are usually for referencepurposes only. Chapter III will provide a more in-depth insight into my methodological considerations in the Radcliffe College Archives.

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In the light of these recent developments, the North American archival community offers the following guidelines for selecting items or collections for digitization projects. Select items . . . • • • • • •

should support lifelong education and learning, should reinforce a shared national consciousness and informed citizenship, and should be linked to economic growth and job creation. [. . .] should target user populations, should understand the needs and expectations of users, and should identify ‘measurable deliverables’ that will demonstrate benefits. (Library and Archives of Canada as quoted in Hooper 95)

It is interesting to note that institutional structures, mainly the granting agencies that fund only certain kind of archives, are still using their power to determine archival content as well as archival access.14 Especially in this “adolescent period in digital preservation development” (Nadal 290), it is important to develop a reliable digital archiving process. Although there is a large pool of research available that contextualizes the role of today’s electronic librarians and archivists, the speedy pace of changing trends on how to create reliable online archives makes this process a challenging task. The convenience of digital archives, such as accessibility and search-ability—factors that hugely contribute to the efficiency of scholarly research—appears to be a major reason why historical researchers are attracted to digitized artifacts. For example, distance to locate resources becomes less of a challenge for researchers. However,

14 Funding is usually contingent on the type of archival sources, for example digital objects, specifically archaeological documents, data sets (databases and spreadsheets), and images all require vastly different financial support. While some sources are easier to digitize—or are already available in digital format—other records, such as fragile historical documents, require intensive labor.

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at times a researcher may want or need to interface directly with the physical archives, especially as being “on location” can help historians build a more intimate relationship with the artifact. At the same time, the remote access to digital archives allows a wider accessibility of collections, especially to those, who do not hold the traditional credentials—such as advanced degrees—to gain access to fragile cultural artifacts. Megan A. Norcia rightfully states that, “Freely available, these resources can enhance the learning experience of students by enabling them to “handle” the material traditionally available to scholars with the proper credentials and the funds to travel to sometimes distant archives” (96). While the doors of physical archives might indeed be closed to the general public—or at least only accessible through lengthy administrative processes—digital environments are not only accessible and open at a global level, but represent a way to protect archival collections from the inevitable damage that occurs through manual handling. Microfilm holdings popularized in the 1970s were a precursor to the digital age and many still exist in libraries and archives around the world. Those Microfilm holdings are often inconvenient to use, as they do not offer cross-search capabilities. In this context, Roger Matuz and Nancy Godleski assert that, “Digital databases, in contrast, offer fullpage images and text in their original context, robust search capabilities and increased retrieval speed” (132). To continue their argument, it is important to examine the additional benefits in digital environments, such as tools that allow researchers to handle historically fragile documents through zooming, stretching, cutting, and annotating documents. This digital engagement with primary sources can enhance the researcher’s experience through direct interaction. Researchers will increasingly benefit from the kind of technology-based archives provided through digitization. Gerald Beasley coined the term “reverse technological barrier” (22-3), where “patrons are bringing more and more electronic technology into archives—laptops, digital cameras, handheld scanners, and the like” (23). The ease of technology as a vital research tool facilitates the growth of digital archiving, as it represents

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an extension of existing patterns for conducting scholarly research supported through technological advancements. On the surface it may seem that digital archives provide an easier way to conduct historical research by enabling individuals access to a range of multimedia resources hosted in institutions around the world. In fact, however, researchers need to acquire many specific skills, such as working with complicated online archival search information systems or touch screen interfaces of handheld devices in order to work efficiently with a large amount of digitally retrieved research material. Therefore, even though huge amounts of digitally retrieved records are a legacy of the digital turn and portray the trend toward greater access to archival materials, it is also true that digital archives can open the gates to a flood of potential leads and information requiring timeconsuming triage in an attempt to find the appropriate archival material. Even with the above cautionary notes about possible limitations of digital archival searching, broadly speaking for institutions and libraries, the overarching value of digital archives is the enhancement of historical collections. Digital archiving is further valuable for libraries in a multitude of ways as it creates greater access to existing physical archives and preserves valuable archival content (James-Gilboe 156). Indeed, digital archiving provides not only an arena of heightened selection, but also offers access to special collections that—in a physical archive—need to be handled with the utmost care. Roger Matuz and Nancy Godleski note that, “Fragile paper documents can be better preserved through less frequent handling and through digitization, historical content can be made readily available to a wider range of people” (132). In this way, digitization allows libraries to provide a higher level of service to their patrons while also preserving the physical well-being of the artifacts, documents, and records. In this context it is important to reiterate that digital archives provide remote access (James-Gilboe 156), allowing researchers to access historical data from any remote location. Lynda James-Gilboe observes that, the “expanding selection of digital archives is being driven by

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changes in research patterns, especially the growing interest in primary sources; improvements in technological processes; and the accelerating drive to have content readily accessible electronically” (159). Consequently, digital archives act as a catalyst for promoting scholarship by offering easy access as well as heightened selection to primary resources without any global borders. Indeed, digital archiving is a global phenomenon, in which “institutions world-wide are engaged in large-scale initiatives to digitize cultural artifacts and make these available to the general public” (Given and McTavish 22). A future goal for the archival community, a goal eagerly anticipated by historical researchers, is the interfacing of archival sites, such that hyperlinks will take the researcher directly from one archive to another. Recent innovations in technology, such as faster platforms and interconnected archival systems, allow individuals to access a range of multimedia resources hosted in institutions around the world. It follows, then, that the recent growth of digital archives results in a synergetic effect: digital archives are responsive to the needs of a future generation of digital researchers and institutions and they also allow this growth in response to the desire to not threaten the physical condition of the research artifact. While the expanding selection of digital archives is being driven by the needs of researchers with an avid interest in accessible and enhanced primary source material, it is also important to consider that digital archives also represent an institutional value. In fact, one might argue that digital archives secure the future of libraries and physical archives by creating an awareness of existing collections. As Lisa Hooper puts it, “As digital archives and historical societies begin to perceive the value of digital archives for creating awareness of their institutions (thus helping to ensure their survival), these digital archives and islands of memory are being created with renewed energy and efficiency” (96). While the digitization of large physical archives might represent difficult projects for institutions, Lynda James-Gilboe asserts that, “in spite of daunting challenges, it’s worth the trouble” (156), as it brings historical research into the future. In particular, cross-searchable

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digital archives projects provide maximum research value as they provide additional context. An example of one commercial digitization project employing cross indexing platforms is the ProQuest Historical Newspapers™, an initiative that digitizes distinguished national newspapers, such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, and The Washington Post, to name a few, from their first issues up to the present, cover to cover. This large-scale digitization process captures a large variety of additional information, such as photos, display advertising, and editorial cartoons enabling researchers who investigate the historical archives to provide additional context for and from the news. As Lynda James-Gilboe points out, “The ability to examine the coverage of the news, events, and opinions across the spectrum of these publishers enhances the value of the digitized newspaper for end users” (157). For researchers, careful attention to the historical content of newspapers within the ProQuest Historical Newspapers™ opens up much larger opportunities to contextualize historical events, and contributes to a more diverse and informed research output. The creation of these large digital collections offers scholars the opportunity to conduct historical research in a non-linear way, in which users make connections across a myriad of archival sources, often unattainable by many researchers in the past. While the future of digital archives appears to open new doors into exciting research opportunities, librarians and curators of digital archives have to be concerned about the long-term preservation of digital archives. As Inga K. Hsieh, Kathleen R. Murray, and Cathy Nelson Hartman caution: “With digital information, whose life span can be as short as one software upgrade, the decision to preserve must be made almost simultaneously with its creation” (18). Attention to life span is crucial. Digital archives must be designed for indefinite access to the content through software and hardware updates that can potentially destroy hyperlinks and eventually lose track of websites altogether. Therefore, the creation and maintenance of digital archives relies on long-term financial funding. In the same way that archivists during

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the second half of the twentieth century had to deal with the overflood of documents—including poor funding and inadequate staffing— today’s archivists must certainly insure “a commitment to long-term financial support [. . .] and ongoing collaborations among librarians and information technology professionals” (Hsieh, Murray, and Nelson Hartman 23). While this issue is not of immediate concern to researchers, it is important to develop an understanding of the processes behind the creation and preservation of digital archives in order to appreciate and fully benefit over time from digital archiving as a research methodology and tool. Before I explore a few selected digital archives more in depth, it is important to remember that physical archiving was and still is a very traditional way to access and preserve history. Digital archiving, thus, seems to be a logical progression in which new technologies and curricula lead the study and practice of history into new territory of acquiring, documenting, representing, and providing access to knowledge of history. However, the complexity of digital archives can be discomfiting and intimidating for historians who are seasoned scholars in conventional practice—traditionally gathering evidence through finer and finer grids of note-taking in physical archives—but may be novice scholars in the world of digital archives. In the wisely-titled article “What’s Old is New Again: The Reconvergence of Libraries, Archives, and Museums in the Digital Age,” Lisa M. Given and Lianne McTavish write, “As cultural institutions begin to share physical and human resources, and as new technologies reshape approaches to access and preservation, educational programs must respond in kind” (7). While digital archives reshape researchers’ experience of historical research, they necessitate new skill development and training within academic institutions. Digital archives recast old ideas, but these contemporary versions of traditional archives have a spirit and style of their own to foster historical scholarship in a twenty-first century fashion by democratizing the doing of history. This holds true, at least for those with access to computers and knowledge for how to access materials. As Cheryl Ma-

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son Bolick summarizes, “The creation of digital archives has shifted the dynamics of doing historical research by changing who is able to conduct the research and how historical research is done” (122). In this light, it is crucial to foster the growth of digital archives in order to “preserve scholarly content for generations to come, and we need them now” (Tibbitts 111). Digital archives are an exciting way to conduct historical research in a landscape transformed by new technologies as the following examples in the next section demonstrate.

D IGITAL ARCHIVES

IN THE

P ERFORMING ARTS

While a salient caution for archivists in this process of creating a digital archive is to temper the excitement with attention to a careful selection process, at the same time researchers have to be cautious of the completeness of digital archives.15 Without a doubt, the lack of transparency of the selection process is a difficult issue in digital archiving as “projects often fail to clarify whether the correspondence made available online represents the totality of the collection or if the correspondence is merely a selection from the total collection” (Hooper 96). The following two examples of digital archiving in the performing arts, the OnStage digital theatre archive collection at Indiana UniversityPurdue University Fort Wayne (IPFW) and the Shakespeare Electronic Archive based at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), will shed light on the complexity of the selection processes. While there are numerous publications that examine the broad factors archivists must consider in selecting items for digitization, such as accessibility, copyright issues, costs of specialized preservation needs, and target audience, only a few articles focus on archiving performing arts collections. Although the examples I have selected for this topic represent theatre rather than dance-based digital archiving, they do reveal archiv-

15 An example of this issue can be found in my post-scriptum note.

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ing trends that have some universality even within the broad pluralism of archiving the performing arts. The OnStage digital theatre archive collection at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne was launched in 2007. An original concern for the archives was to create an overarching structure that would facilitate indexing and access through metadata fields. According to Denise Buhr, the team for OnStage had to make decisions about the “metadata fields, which necessitated the writing of a dictionary to define those fields and guidelines for creating the metadata” (67).16 It is important to note that the creating of the metadata is a continuing process, which is constantly revised as new material is added. The team also decided to include material from local newspapers, particularly preview articles and reviews to provide context for the other items about a show. While not all items in the physical collection were added to the digital archives, the team decided to include every show from each season. Initially, the digital collection was launched with one season from each decade to give a historical overview of the development of theatre at IPFW. This process of what to include and exclude from a collection begs the question as to what extent decisions currently made by archivists take over a job that was traditionally reserved for historians, thus directing the nature of research collection. Denise Buhr notes that during the early stages, “the rationale for the selection process was not very clearly articulated” (68), but eventually the team decided that archival material from each play would be limited to no more than fifty items. Although this figure seemed to be arbitrary at first, Denise Buhr states that, “For most productions, that number is never even approached” (68), though there are certainly exceptions to this rule. The overriding consideration is what a particular item adds to the understanding of the

16 Denise Buhr is the liaison librarian to the College of Visual and Performing Arts at IPFW and serves as interim archivist. She is also playwright-inresidence for the Primrose Theatre Project, a professional women’s theatre company.

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theatrical presentation of the play. All theatre reviews were digitized, including a selection of press releases. Action shots are selected over “headshots” because they represent particular scenes and help show the progress of the play. Ideally, the quantity and quality of photographs for all the main characters should be balanced. Material is also scanned in the sequence of the action of the play to allow a visual unfolding of the narrative. In her conclusion, Denise Buhr confesses that: The selection guidelines for this mDON collection are a work-in-progress, as is the collection itself. […] criteria for choosing individual items will be revised as different types of material or new circumstances warrant. But one thing will not change: whether an item fills all the criteria or doesn’t fit any, if an item ignites the content manager’s passion for the stage and shows to the rest of the world the high quality of theatre in northeast Indiana, it’s likely it will make its way into OnStage at IPFW. (70)17

Buhr’s descriptive exploration demonstrates the complexity of structuring a digital archive, which seems to be in constant flux, maneuvering between established selection guidelines and the content manager’s personal passion as well as a preference for a particular play. While it seems important to have well-articulated guidelines, Buhr’s description demonstrates that it is ultimately up to the content manager to decide if an item is a good fit. Another example of the advancement in performing arts archiving represents the Shakespeare Electronic Archive, which is based at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). This theatre archive also uses digital connections to support the researcher’s need to connect archival leads, and thus help the researcher to get a better understanding of source materials. The digital archive was launched in 1992 and has

17 The decision-making teams consisted of librarians-archivists with a background in theatre and a technical team (web designer) to build the digital archive.

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experienced major updates since its inception to serve both as a scholarly and pedagogical tool. As Peter S. Donaldson notes: Our efforts as teachers and scholars were shifting too—away from the chimera of the single, authorial text toward the idea of an expanded text that included textual variations, performances and even adaptations in media unknown to Shakespeare. Plans for the Shakespeare Electronic Archive were directed to the goal of making such a text readable by linking all materials to the lines of text to which they were relevant. (250-1)

This linking of materials occurs through a cross-media digital environment approach. For example, users are able to add notes to videos, store playable extracts in electronic notebooks, and juxtapose a variety of readings and interpretations of texts in images and films. A major innovation is an online tool called XMAS, a cross-media annotation system, which was introduced in 2002. “XMAS consists of tools for rapidly defining and annotating video clips or selecting images and for using these excerpts in online discussions, multimedia essays and presentation” (Donaldson 251). Internal studies revealed that using XMAS can have “a transforming impact on what students can learn” (Donaldson 253) due to the wide range of sources that can be juxtaposed to explore Shakespeare. Since 2007, the Shakespeare Electronic Archive is further expanding to include scholarly literature that is produced in Asia, allowing researchers to explore the relationship between local, national, regional, and global culture related to Shakespeare. Peter S. Donaldson admits that, “There is no one Asian Shakespeare, but it makes sense to try to map the highly divergent yet interconnected terrain of Shakespeare in Asia since the late 1980s” (257). Both archives, OnStage and the Shakespeare Electronic Archive, demonstrate methods for how primary source material is selected, presented, and indexed and the future potential for teaching and research each method portrays. The next section explores more in depth the state of preservation and documentation of dance in North America by shedding light on the work of the Dance Heritage Coalition.

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P RESERVING AND D OCUMENTING D ANCE IN AMERICA The Dance Heritage Coalition, founded in 1992 and based in Washington, DC, is the alliance of the nation’s major dance collections. Their mission is to “collect and preserve materials, but also to make these materials available to a wide range of users” (Jaszi 5). To make dance accessible through dance collections is crucial because these collections often represent the only source for what was originally an ephemeral cultural phenomenon. According to the Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use of Dance-Related Materials, and similar to recent developments in archiving theatre-related materials, new technologies for data storage, indexing, and access have become the “preferred options for preservation practices” (Jaszi 8). The scholarly engagement with dance is also dependent on myriad of materials, such as still and moving images, dance notation and musical scores, costume and set design, as well as textual dance sources, to name a few. For dance collections like those in theatre, digital archiving is opening new opportunities into the needs of the dance scholar as these “innovations are expected to create new methodologies for access and research, once materials are transferred to the new [digital] format” (Jaszi 8). Since the Internet further serves as a vital instrument for accessing dance material, it is reasonable to predict that most dance collections will update their methods of serving the public through web-based information exchange: currently dance collections are posting archival material on their websites, ranging from indexed thumbnail digital files, to moving image clips, and online exhibitions. While the digital turn seems to strengthen the position of dance through its seemingly universal access, the unrestricted online delivery of dance is uncertain due to conservative policies of archival collections or the prohibition of publicly accessible online use of copyrighted material. As Peter Jaszi observes, “Where rights holders object to online use or where the licensing systems breaks down, the feasibility of otherwise desirable web-based uses is thrown into doubt” (16).

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While it is reasonable to suggest that certain web-based activities, such as thumbnail images and descriptions of archival holdings, would qualify as fair use, the specific creation of web-based resources may extend beyond fair use. The Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use of Dance-Related Materials (15-6) provides guidelines about how to interpret these principles: (a) take reasonable precautions that textual and visual materials are fully identified and attributed; (b) devise an internal policy for selection and amount of materials; (c) offer significant contextual information to put the dance material into a framework; (d) provide technologies that prevent the downloading of material, and embed material with permanent indicators of their source, such as watermarks; and (e) provide users with information about copyright infringement and fair use. It is reasonable to assert that the pervasiveness of the digital turn has created an increased demand from dance scholars to get access to archival records. At the same time, digital culture creates serious concerns for dance collections in terms of copyright infringements and the legal consequences of these actions. Along with basic copyright infringement is the concern that digital material can easily be reproduced, transmitted, altered, or otherwise misused despite the protective stance taken by many dance archives. While embedding permanent information about the authorship and ownership of archival material, for example through watermarking, attempts to protect archival holdings, the fair use statement does not clearly cover all aspects. In particular, “orphan works,” materials presumably copyrighted but whose owner cannot be identified, are rampant in dance images and also problematic in terms of clear copyright procedures. In the case of these “orphans,” the Statement of Best Practices in Fair Use of Dance-Related Materials recommends that “users should subject their use of orphan works to the same consideration that are used for any materials under the fair use doctrine” (18). However, how to do this when the owner is unknown is not defined. Therefore, even though it is safe to say that digital archiving occupies a central place in the future of dance preservation and research, it still has many

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contentious issues to confront before becoming an easily accessible tool for the researcher. These issues are fast becoming part of the current archival discourse and quickly shaping the direction this discourse will take in the future. The following methodology chapter will further discuss how the archival discourse manifests itself in the construction of both physical and digital records and the writing of histories. In particular, it will shed light on current developments in the narrative writing of “archive stories,” a term coined by Antoinette Burton to describe the archival experience of researchers, and how these experiences illuminate the power of archives to shape the narratives. The methodology chapter will also reiterate the value of archival story-ing as an important contribution to the future of historical writing.

III. Archival Story-ing as Methodology Experiencing the Archival Discourse

Many books could (and should) be written by archivists about their professional history, across the centuries and millennia, across cultures, languages, gender, and nationalities, across differing media and differing types of record creators, across the bridge of theory and practice, that is, across the chasm of the guiding principles and ideas on one side and their actual implementation in archival institutions on the other. (TERRY COOK 3)

F IRST - HAND E XPERIENCES OF THE ARCHIVAL D ISCOURSE Cook’s assertion in the above quotation reflects the importance and need for archival and historical researchers not only to organize and record information discovered within archives, but also to narrate how

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they developed their journeys, their actual implementation into archival research, and their resulting presentation of that research. Adding to Cook’s further writings into how the historian might include his or her experiences in the archive within the research process, Antoinette Burton coined the term “archive stories” to describe the recent development of narrating archival experiences which portray how the power of the archives can shape the research narratives told. Indeed, Burton emphasizes that the “story-ing” of archival processes as a noteworthy discipline not only shapes how archival research is conducted, but also elucidates the researcher’s actual encounter with archives and archival sources. Taking the emergence of archive stories as a starting point for my own research, my interest in exploring and narrating my archival journey at the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) at Harvard University’s Schlesinger Library (SL) requires a deeper understanding of narrative inquiry as a methodological tool for creating my own archive stories. Therefore, the archive stories of dance at Radcliffe College that I created (chapter IV, V, and VI) aim to shed light on the process of conducting archival research at the RCA. This archival story-ing does not assume to represent an in-depth historical study of the development of dance at Radcliffe College; instead, by narrating my archival journey, I illuminate the various entries, crossroads, and paths that I came across during my actual “dance encounters” at the RCA. However, while my archive stories do not present archival research as a historical methodology per se, they do portray how research is consequently directed by the choices the researcher makes during the archival journey and how those choices might open possibilities for future historical research. My archive stories, therefore, explore archival research as a tool through which I “trouble” archival source material in search of dance education histories. Ultimately, this approach serves as a methodological framework to narrate my own archival research experience in which I discover a lost history of dance in education, a history that I use to connect archival theory with its ongoing practice.

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This methodology chapter is divided into two parts: the first part reviews a series of scholarly archive stories, shedding light on the archival discourse outside as well as inside the performing arts domain. The second part explores my own methodological approach to my archival journey at the RCA, putting emphasis on how I created, drew upon, experienced, and explored the archive stories for this research project. Here, I explain the organization of the archive stories into three data chapters and the how my own experiences add to the archival discourse.

ARCHIVE S TORIES

FROM

AROUND

THE

W ORLD

In this section, I present brief accounts of published archive stories in which the authors recount their own experiences in order to portray developments currently taking place within archival discourses. In my review of these accounts, I move from more general archive stories featuring a variety of academic disciplines to specific stories that explore archival journeys in the performing arts. These archive stories not only demonstrate the importance of the development of archival theory as an emerging academic field, but also identify ways in which historians can approach the interpretation of archival and documentary evidence. However, the focus of the review section is not on the intricate details of each archive story, but rather on providing a general framework for how researchers work and describing this process of working within a variety of archival repositories. The purpose of the first part of this chapter, then, is to initiate a vital conversation about how archival discourses represent a growing academic field, and ultimately prepare the reader for how to enter my own narration of an archival journey. Of particular interest to my research, especially in regard to devising my own methodological approach, is how scholars have created archive stories that interweave their research experiences with the historical source material found in their chosen archives. Antoinette Burton’s Archive Stories illustrates a multitude of repositories and record offices

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where researchers narrate their actual archival encounters and create histories from archival source material. Although none of the featured archive stories deals with dance or education, Burton compiled experiences in the archival world—most of which are written by historians— that provide invaluable insights into current archival scholarship, giving the reader a sense of the decisions these researchers made in the archive. A research narrative included in Antoinette Burton’s edition of Archive Stories is Craig Robertson’s “Mechanism of Exclusion: Historicizing the Archive and the Passport” in which he explores his archival research journey for his doctoral dissertation on the emergence of the passport in the United States. Robertson describes in detail his visit to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) of the United States in College Park, Maryland, taking the reader on a journey that starts “on a public bus that is approaching the driveway to Archive II” (68). Robertson’s narrative parodies the strict surveillance regime of the NARA, where even an official NARA card “does not prevent the guards from screening his newspaper (though not his umbrella)” (Burton 11). By recounting his personal experience at the NARA, Robertson offers an insightful reflection on how the archival visit shaped his research and the questions he pursued. As Robertson narrates: With the passing of each successful or unsuccessful hour at NARA, my thoughts wander to the collection of nineteenth-century and early-twentiethcentury Passport Office files boxed up in the Department of State to which I have been denied access; a denial that has caused me to again question what makes it into a state archive. (69)

Robertson’s personal reflections eventually turn into research questions, when, for example, he examines what it means to have limited access to a collection. The narration of his archival research becomes an example of the logistical difficulties of archival encounters and the

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ways in which they can limit the stories that are told. Antoinette Burton reflects on Robertson’s work when she concludes: The story of how archives come to be rationalized can and should be part of the histories we write, precisely because the literal, physical encounter with them can have such a profound effect on how one comes to understand and appreciate the histories they throw into bold relief. (11)

The implication for conducting archival research is, therefore, not limited to historical writing as the sole outcome. Rather, it suggests that an integration of narrating archival encounters into the writing of history leads to the development of insightful possibilities for how history might be imagined, a methodological approach that I find inspiring for my own research. Robertson’s work also makes explicit that, by taking archival practices outside of their specific institutional location, archival records can be historicized more effectively since the “distortions offered in the claims to ‘objectivity’ and ‘authenticity’ granted an archive become more apparent” (83). In the case of Robertson’s history of the passport, the research shows that the NARA engaged in archival practices to produce a “truth apparatus” (71) that is, a document to explain who “we” are and where “we” came from in the form of a passport. Thus, the passport, or the absence thereof, illustrates the link between national identity and archive as mechanisms of exclusion established by the people who created the archive. By providing a history of how this archive was set up—what was included and left out—Robertson illustrates how archives create national narratives in which specific stories and people are prioritized and privileged. Another narrative provided in Antoinette Burton’s edition is John Randolph’s “The Bakunin Family Archive,” a story which represents an example of close and physical interactions with archival materials, literally “living with the archive” (20), in order to historicize narratives of domestic life in modern Russia. Randolph illustrates how he understood his own research in a small, more private archive allowing the

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reader to get a sense of histories that tend to be left out. He calls this process, “a memoir of my [his] own acquaintance” (211). I find this approach fascinating for my own research, specifically as an exploration of dance education histories at Radcliffe College represents virgin territory for research on Harvard history. In particular, Randolph illustrates the ways in which the rhythms of daily life have contributed to the emergence of this archival collection. As Randolph deals with a small private family archive, he is able to distill biographical accounts that challenge the traditionally gendered perception of “archive as public and male and domesticity as private and female” (Burton 14). Although the main source of his analysis is the evidence provided by the Bakunin archive itself, both textual and physical, Randolph’s biographical approach allows him to describe the emergence of the archival collection over time, as it is “the product of generations of archival work” (213), and his process of unearthing the materials represented. Randolph’s story begins with a narration of his first encounter with the Bakunin family archive in which he explains his own lived experience in the archive in relation to its history. Randolph states that as “its [the archive’s] biographer, I am also its contemporary” (211). In the section subtitled “At Home in Pushkin House, Part One,” Randolph invites the reader to experience the historical development of the archive by describing in detail how the Bakunin archive changed hands multiple times, and how this process affected the conceptual formation and physical evolution of the archive. For example, Rudolph states: In 1905, fearing radical arson near her home in the Crimea, Natalia Bakunina sent her carefully crafted collection of family papers to an estate in central Russia, owned by her good friends the Petrunkevich family. The Bakunin archive remained there for several years, before being claimed, with the Bakunin’s permission, by the historian Kornilov. (219)

Kornilov’s inquiry and description of the Bakunin archive then placed domesticity at the center of the historical analysis, revealing the close ties between family life and the emergence of social thought in Imperi-

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al Russia. Randolph suggests that only Kornilov’s close interaction with the archive, that is “living with the archive” (220), allowed him to take the archive apart in order to reconstruct a history that brought family documents into the public sphere. In “At Home in Pushkin House, Part Two,” a rather short section in Randolph’s chapter, he guides the reader through his own encounter with the archive in the early 1990s within the context of “the new Russia.” He describes his experience “through the ritual of taking tea with the archivists” (225) as a gradual instruction into the culture of the archive. In growing into his role as an “insider archivist,” Randolph gained access to more intimate treasures that were hidden away in the corners of the archive’s cabinet. Randolph ends the chapter with a brief but persuasive analysis of “The Unburned Letter,” which reveals details of Mikhail Bakunin’s conspiracy to liberate his sister Varvara. Despite Bakunin’s handwritten command, “TO BE BURNED” (Randolph 226) on the letter’s left-hand margin, the Bakunin family archive never honored this command, but simply ignored it. Indeed, the letter bears markings, such as paginations, of several generations of archivists. As Randolph reflects: Yet this is exactly the sort of biographical text that the virtual reproduction of archives will increasingly reveal. Whether or not historians choose to be interested in archives’ stories, the lives of collections are becoming more visible; they need to incorporate their biographies into our own, more plain. (226)

As Randolph gives the reader a sense of his experience in the Bakunin Family Archive, he is opening up insights into Russian history. The brevity of Randolph’s analysis—in total consisting of three pages for the “At Home in Pushkin House, Part Two”—also suggests one can consider his “found” historical object, the handwritten letter, as an invitation for historians to dig deeper into how these personal and private experiences, those which are traditionally left out in historical writing, might bring new historical insights. It is the narration of these experiences as they bring to life the connections between the past and pre-

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sent, which foster my understanding of narrative inquiry as a methodological tool for creating archive stories.

M ORE T ALES F ROM

THE

ARCHIVES

Gesa E. Kirsch and Liz Rohan’s anthology Beyond the Archives also inspired my own methodological approach as it illuminates the nature of working with archival material by unfolding the experience of conducting archival or historical research. In particular, I found myself deeply connected to these authors’ extensive use of first person causing their narratives to be even more personal than the ones I encountered in Antoinette Burton’s Archive Stories. It is important to note that both publications can be considered as groundbreaking on the landscape of archival research as “they mark the change from reading an archive not just as a source but also as a subject” (Lucille M. Schultz vii). One narrative provided by Beyond the Archives is David Gold’s “The Accidental Archivist: Embracing Change and Confusion in Historical Scholarship.” Gold narrates his journey navigating through university archives in search of diverse experiences of students and educators at previously marginalized institutional sites, such as historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) or women’s institutions. Gold further describes his research career as a series of “happy accidents” (13), which allowed him to delve into new ways of approaching educational historiography—historical work on educational topics—through archival research. Gold found that most historians of education presumed that “curricular innovation begins in elite colleges and thereafter filters down to less prestigious institutions” (14). However, when Gold picked up a copy of the local newspaper in a coffee shop, he came across an article about a 1915 graduate of the city’s historically black Huston-Tillotson College who had just turned 105 years. Gold refers to this chance encounter in the coffee shop as a “happy accident” (14) which sparked his interest to “hit the archives” (14) in order to learn more about HBCUs. Gold’s initial conception of the project was fo-

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cused on rhetorical education at HBCUs, but soon his research opened up to include a wider range of alternative institutional sites, such as women’s colleges, that had also been marginalized by previous educational histories. Gold refers to himself as “accidental archivist,” admitting that he “had no idea it [his research] would turn out this way at the start” (18). Accidental discoveries and chance encounters are part of archival research. As Gold puts it, “The process of doing archival research is largely organic. […] We never know where an archive will lead” (18). Experiences like Gold’s series of “happy accidents,” leading to a trail of archival material, illuminate how archival research can move forward from a chance encounter to scholarly research that enriches the many facets of the past. Gold’s series of “happy accidents” resonated with me as they gave a sense of how chance encounters might open up my own process when entering Radcliffe College, a women’s college originally created as a separate entity from Harvard University. Gesa E. Kirsch’s “Being on Location: Serendipity, Place, and Archival Research” represents another archive story in which a chance encounter deepened and expanded Kirsch’s intellectual engagement with her archival research. Kirsch’s archival project investigated the life and writings of Dr. Mary Bennett Ritter, a nineteenth century physician in Berkeley, California. In her quest to study Ritter’s papers on location at the Bancroft Library Archives, Kirsch’s stay at the Bancroft Hotel, which she had “chosen for its convenient location at the edge of campus and its reasonable rates” (21), brought history back to life when she discovered Ritter’s portrait in the hotel’s sitting room. Kirsch learned that the hotel had been the former women’s club, the University of California Prytanean Women’s Honor Society, of which Ritter was a founding member. “Staying at the Bancroft Hotel certainly was a serendipitous choice” (21), says Kirsch, which led her on an unexpected trail of archival information about university life during the late nineteenth century. Her experience of discovering source material, such as Ritter’s portrait, not only enriched her research experience, but

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also shaped the way Kirsch constructed her historical research. Kirsch reflects that: The simple fact of being there, in Berkeley, walking across campus many times, jogging on the local trails, joining a campus tour, reading street and building names—all these activities made it much easier for me to read the handwritten correspondence and diary entries that prominently featured local places and events. (22)

Kirsch’s “being on location” experience not only guided her archival leads, but also colored her interpretation of archival material. While at the beginning of her project, Kirsch’s archival materials appeared to be limited to the physical archive only, exploring the actual locations and surroundings where the historical subject lived proved to be invaluable to Kirsch’s writing of history. As such, this archive story is a vivid description of what it means to “walk in the footsteps of a historical subject” (20), thus location-and-place-as-archive is another critical methodological approach that should not be underestimated in archival research. Kirsch’s narrative was very inspiring for my own methodology, as her vivid descriptions of physically investigating the areas surrounding the archive demonstrated the extent to which “being on location” has a direct influence on the decisions an archival researcher makes on a daily basis. After reading Kirsch, I found myself actively paying attention to location-and-place-as-archive as I walked to Radcliffe College, attended dance classes at the Harvard Dance Center, and discovered the surroundings of the Radcliffe Yard as well as the Harvard Yard. Physically investigating the areas that I found mentioned in the archive allowed me to embed my archival findings in a lush narrative that evolved from being on location. Another narrative in Beyond the Archives is Elizabeth (Betsy) Birmingham’s “‘I See Dead People’: Archive, Crypt, and an Argument for the Researcher’s Sixth Sense” that represents an example of how an author builds a relationship with her historical subject, although the re-

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searcher only “met” her on paper in the archives, “a phenomenon of research rarely articulated or made public” (Kirsch and Rohan 7). Birmingham, a historian-turned-rhetorician, puts forth that her archival research about female architect Marion Mahony Griffin led her to discover the researcher’s sixth sense, which “isn’t the ability to see the dead but our potential to help the dead, who do not know they are dead, finish their stories, and we do this in the moment in which we realize that their stories are ours” (Birmingham 144). Through her archival work, which she describes as “research as lived experience” (139) over a period of more than fifteen years, Birmingham developed a relationship with her historical subject that eventually allowed her to better imagine the experiences and struggles of a woman working in a male profession. For example, Birmingham recounts that initially she was discouraged from writing about her chosen historical subject, “because Griffin was not interesting to Birmingham’s male mentors” (Kirsch and Rohan 7). Admittedly, the scholarship about Griffin’s architectural achievements was thin, especially as most of Griffin’s work appears to be overshadowed by her husband’s rather successful architectural practice. Birmingham discloses that she became certain that her “engagement with an interest in the text and its author suggested something lax about [her] scholarship—a lack of discernment that would mark [her] naïve and unsophisticated” (142). Birmingham’s engagement with Griffin’s well-documented life and achievements, such as buildings she designed, publications, letters, and an autobiography, led to a “friendship with a woman who died before [Birmingham] was born” (144). Through her archival experience—building a “human” connection and developing a professional relationship with her historical subject— Birmingham felt empowered to document Griffin’s marginalized professional life. Similar to how Birmingham’s research illustrates her process of engaging with archival methodology—or what she calls “research as lived experience”—I found that my own archive stories embedded elements of this type of lived experience. In fact, Birmingham’s work il-

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luminates that the archival process is as vital as the actual research outcome. In particular, I found inspiration in Birmingham’s wisdom, when she narrates that, “But sometimes, when we are very lucky, we see dead people—people whose will won’t be ignored—the relationship becomes reciprocal, and the work we do together leads to friendship and collaboration. That is the story I have to tell” (140). I resonate with Birmingham’s idea of developing the “sixth sense” in which the researcher encourages and helps historical figures to “finish their stories . . . in the moment in which we realize that their stories are ours” (144). However, rather than experiencing the “sixth sense,” I formed “affiliations” with the historical figures whom I encountered in the archive. I found it essential to be aware of the historical, cultural, and individual differences between my historical subjects and myself as an archival researcher since it could be too easy to represent their presence and interests through my own experiences as a male dancer with specific aesthetic values. This awareness often shaped how I carefully presented the source material, but it also led me to openly choose certain paths to follow in terms of my own personal interests. I found myself constantly shifting between the need to remain distant from my resources and the pleasure of intimately following my own path through the archive.

ARCHIVE S TORIES

IN THE

P ERFORMING ARTS

While the previous section acknowledges the broader field of archive stories in various disciplines, the next section explores the small pool of publications that investigate discourses in performing arts archives. It is certainly true that archival story-ing as a methodological tool is a relative newcomer to the academic field of performing arts research. Over the past few years, however, a small but growing number of researchers have documented their experience of working with performing arts source material, thus creating a very specific niche among archival discourse writings. The following examples provide insights in-

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to these archive stories and ultimately inspire the development of my own methodology when conducting archival research with a specific interest in dance as a performing art. It is certainly true that a live performance compels the audience through its transient nature, or as Peggy Phelan argues in Unmarked: The Politics of Performance, “performance becomes itself through disappearance” (146), but it is exactly the ephemeral nature of performance that is the ultimate challenge for all archivists. In “Redefining the Performing Arts Archive,” Sarah Jones, Daisy Abbott, and Seamus Ross investigate representations of performance and the role of the archive by raising questions about applying traditional archival definitions to the performing arts: If the significant property of performance is its transience, are all attempts to archive performance futile? Are we trying to capture something at the very point at which it slips away? […] Can we provide a fair and reliable version of the past through the records we create and select for posterity, when so much of human experience is inherently interactive, experiential, and performative? (166-7)

While a performance is defined through the notion of disappearance, an archive represents a “physical trace of the events” (Jones, Abbott, and Ross 168) that can capture at the most a fraction of the actual performance. It is, therefore, important to realize that an archive, especially in the performing arts, provides only partial evidence of the past in forms of paper programs, photographs, and audio-visual recordings of the performance. It is fair to say that an archival record is in a definite state, or a “single end product” as Jones and colleagues observed, whereas performances are “constantly in a state of becoming and have no definable end” (169). Consequently, the authors suggest exploring archival models that encourage records to evolve rather than preserving or keeping them static. In fact, they suggest that the “key to preservation is reuse” (169), an approach in which archival records themselves are reinvented as new performance events.

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For example, performing arts archivists could offer workshops that allow participants not only to experience archival material, but also to (re)contextualize and (re)present these materials to new audiences. “It is impossible for records to capture the atmosphere and experience of any given moment, but perhaps if we view them as a score or formula to be reinterpreted, we can help people come closer to understanding the past” (Jones, Abbott, and Ross 170). Although it seems difficult to allow records to be re-performed, it is important to consider the relevance of archival records as a performance—a series of complex events—that need to be brought to life to gain a better understanding of their possible meanings. Although Jones and colleagues do not offer approaches for how to revive archival records of performing arts, they do draw parallels between archiving of performance and digital archiving, “as digital records are inherently performative, only coming into existence when the correct code executes the data to render a meaningful output” (170).18 In this context, Jess Allen’s “Depth-charge in the Archive: The Documentation of Performance Revisited in the Digital Age” offers an example of current debates in digital archiving of performance. Allen suggests that digital technology represents both an interactive documentation medium as well as a performance device, which “allows us to upload, disseminate and share personal perspectives on a performance event and to challenge the limiting linearity of bound text and film, navigating dynamically between document-objects and playfully (re)performing the documentation each time we visit it” (61). The digital turn, thus, expands not only ways in which archival records can be stored, but it also has the power to broaden the practice and creative process of creating performances within the archives as users interact with the digital resource thus changing it with each interaction. According to Allen, the use of technology has a long tradition

18 In chapter II, I discuss how the Dance Heritage Coalition puts theory into practice through using digital archiving as a means to preserve performance works.

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in servicing performance, ranging from pointe shoes to stage mechanisms to circus rigging to projections in and onto the space, to dancing avatars and animation, to name only a few. It is clear that technology is integrated in increasingly complex ways into live performances, especially as digital technologies rapidly become more accessible to differing audiences and continue to be reconfigured in the twenty-first century. The advancements in digital capabilities do not only alter performance as archival document, they simultaneously offer innovative ways for documenting these performances which “can then become a more accurate form of documentation of that event than a fixed, singleperspective text, image or film ever could be” (Allen 66). Further, Allen refers to the suggestion of Scott deLahunta and Norah Zuniga Shaw when these dance technologists summarize that documenting the creative process—in addition to the performance—may entail a greater value than solely documenting the performance itself, as it gives both choreographers and performers a greater agency to document their work. “A digital documentation,” argues Allen, “could potentially open up performance documentation to a wider audience by moving away from the conventional and solely visual/text-based representation of live events” (67). Allen’s work shows parallels to my own methodological approach. In fact, Allen’s research of documenting the creative process can be compared to my methodological approach of documenting the process of conducting archival research rather than just documenting the materials I found in the archive. Similar to the arguments put forth by Jones and colleagues concerning how archival records need to be revived and (re)performed in order to gain a better understanding of them, Allen suggests that, “the best means of remaining true to the mutable, ephemeral qualities of performance, is for us to perform the documentation, that is, to be active as individuals in re-animating the event every we [sic] time we visit or revisit its documentary remains” (67). Writing archive stories, then, is a creative way to shed light on the importance of the archival process as a way to bring primary sources to

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life and to show how each archivist could create a different performance with the material. It is clear from the summary of archive stories in the first part of this chapter that the various archival journeys address an extraordinarily wide range of topics that researchers encountered in a multitude of archives. The experiences of these topics then become the narrative threads for the archivists’ stories, narratives which the reader can then imagine and reinterpret with each reading. Although all these narratives refer to different archives, they also link up to each other in fascinating ways by creating a web of methodological approaches. The research examples demonstrate not only the importance of archive stories as a way to trace history, but also as a way to theorize about how historical scholarship can be discussed and practiced in the future. Lucille M. Schultz describes in the foreword to Beyond the Archives what might be an archival dance when she eloquently declares that: With graceful accounts, the authors [of Beyond the Archives] invite readers to accompany them on their research journeys, revealing for us the ways in which the paths they travel are marked by twists and turns, with forward steps and backward steps, with detours and side trips. (vii)

Following Schultz’s claim, the following part will now shed light on my own archival story-ing as methodological process.

ARCHIVAL S TORY - ING AS M ETHODOLOGICAL F RAMEWORK In the second part of this chapter, I explore the methodological approach of narrating my archival experience at the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA). My archival journey and the archive stories that I created (chapter IV, V, and VI) represent a contribution to this newly emerging field of archival discourse in which I explore the process of my archival research and its importance when illuminating how dance

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was experienced within my travels through the RCA. This narrative approach also allowed me to hone in on the impact of my archival decisions when discussing the various research paths that I discovered along my journey. While my archive stories are embedded in historical material exploring stories of dancing women and men at Radcliffe College, my ultimate goal was to shed light on the process of conducting archival research rather than on conducting historical research per se. Hence, this section draws out the implications of my archival journey at the RCA as a methodological tool to reveal the process of searching and discovering dance education histories that otherwise would remain unheard, and as such, it serves as a preparation for the archive stories in the following chapters. Above all, it is vital to realize that archival research as a methodological tool is dependent on the relationship between the individual archive and the individual experience of the researcher working with its materials. Archive stories bring this relationship to life and are to some degree subjective, however explicitly articulated the narrative may be. The scope for personal interpretation is, inevitably, wide, and is present in all phases of the archival research as the variety of archive stories explored in this chapter has demonstrated. Therefore, embarking upon a narration of the archival experience as a methodological tool demands that a researcher considers, carefully, the nature of the approach and the implications for creating archives stories which present the archival institution, the archival material and the people living within that material, and the researcher as all connected and constantly evolving. It is within these shifting connections that new ways of “knowing” potential histories become a collective enterprise rather than a separate activity of a lone archivist. As Lucille M. Schultz eloquently states: Finally to say, the authors of these narratives [archive stories] articulate their methodologies, both planned and unplanned, and the emotions that accompany their work. [. . .] Archival research can be a lonely enterprise. By naming the ways in which their works touches their lives, and the ways in which their lives touch their works, the writers of these narratives help those of us who do histor-

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ical research become part of a collection enterprise, encouraged by knowing that when the research trail takes an unexpected turn or meets a dead end, or even veers off the road into a ditch, we are in good company. (ix)

C REATING , D RAWING U PON , AND E XPERIENCING A RCHIVE S TORIES The emphasis in this final section of the methodology chapter is how I created, drew upon, experienced, and explored archive stories at the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA). Rather than treating archives as sites where dance education knowledge can be retrieved, this research attempted to reveal the archival paths I traveled during my search at the RCA. Rather than writing history per se, narrative archive stories serve as a means for re-telling history in which I explore and put into practice current and cutting edge theories about the archival research process. With this goal in mind, my archive stories hopefully bring to life some of the major issues facing women students in the first of half of the twentieth century and shed light on how young women entering higher education for the first time began to redefine society’s notion about what a woman’s body could express, do, and be. My Visiting Fellowship in affiliation with the Committee on Studies of Women, Gender and Sexuality at Harvard University (2010-12) can be considered a vital element of my research since it enabled me to spend two academic years at the Radcliffe College Archives, the Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Studies, the Harvard Dance Center, and Harvard University. The majority of my data collection at the RCA occurred during the first eight months of my fellowship, from August 2010 until March 2011, where I visited the archives on average two to three times per week.19 Given the initial scarcity of archival material

19 During the second year of my fellowship, I mainly consulted the archive to verify source material, which I located during the period of data collection.

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that I found, the length of each archival visit varied from as short as one or two hours up to full-length days according to the volume of material I encountered on a particular day. Usually, during shorter visits, I spent time browsing through the online search system to look for archival material, which I then ordered for the next day if it was stored off-site. If I was searching through collection boxes, especially those larger boxes which sometimes contained up to thirty individual folders, I typically spent the morning reading through the materials to get an overview; the afternoons were usually filled with a closer reading of the sourced material, which I then photographed with my iPhone, downloaded and labeled on my computer, and transferred to my iPad for easier viewings, a process which Gerald Beasley coined as a “reverse technological barrier” (22-3).20 Throughout the process of collecting sources in the RCA, I kept notes of my archival journey and the paths I decided to take. For example, I would not only write down the keywords I employed to find particular collections, but also the order in which I pulled out the folders from the various boxes. This allowed me to keep a detailed record of my research path and the decisions I made when investigating the primary sources. I also kept notes of conversations with librarians that occurred during various visits. For the majority of the time, I used my laptop to take notes as I am a skilled typist, whereas I experience notekeeping by hand to be a very cumbersome task. Recording the order of my discoveries was also the best way to avoid duplication of archival material, as I could easily check whether I had already consulted a certain folder or whether I still needed to investigate a particular folder or follow up a certain lead. Part of exploring the process of conducting archival research at the RCA involved walking the physical paths that led me to the Radcliffe buildings. Being on location for an extended time was an invaluable asset to my research as it allowed me to literally set foot into Harvard University’s and Radcliffe College’s history. My physical experiences

20 Please see chapter IV for a more detailed narrative of this process.

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of the environment in conjunction with the collected archival data in the RCA, gave me a better understanding of what it means to walk in the footsteps of Radcliffe dance history. My physical presence, both in the archives as well as at the actual locations where dance was taught at Radcliffe College, was a very useful way for me to develop specific descriptions of the space as I tried to put my archival journey into a historical context. In addition to exploring Harvard’s and Radcliffe’s campus locations, I also became actively involved in several student organizations allowing me to explore dance as an extracurricular activity at Harvard. For example, I choreographed for and performed with both the Harvard Ballet Company and the Harvard Early Music Society for four semesters; these helped me not only build a connection with the dance community at Harvard, but also to become an integral part of the history I was researching. While my archive stories only tangentially narrate these paths that I explored outside of the RCA’s walls, they represent an integral part of my archival journey, as they shaped—at least partially—how I experienced the archival process in connection to the lived experiences of those voices speaking within those archives. My approach for writing about the archival journey was also influenced by D. Jean Clandinin’s and F. Michael Connelly’s publication, Narrative Inquiry in Educational Historiography, in which they explore narrative writing as a way of making sense of historical developments in educational settings. In fact, the authors believe that because experience happens narratively, educational experiences should be studied narratively: We might say that if we understand the world narratively, as we do, then it makes sense to study the world narratively. For us, life—as we come to it as it comes to others—is filled with narrative fragments, enacted in storied moments of time and space, and reflected upon and understood in terms of narrative unities and discontinuities. (17)

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I found that the creation of “storied moments” to explore my archival process required a similar methodological approach in which my archival journey is expressed through a narrative. While identifying and documenting the archival research process, I created three archive stories, all of which try to clearly tell the reader how my choices about the shaping of my narration determine specific pictures of the dance material sourced at the RCA. Each archive story is a narration of my process of conducting research at the RCA with a clear beginning and ending point, featuring a clear chronology of events; yet, each story connects one to another. I attempted to create narratives that are lush in description in order to give the reader a sense of how I experienced the archival journey and the resulting archive story. At the same time, I engaged with the source material in order to frame dance details, events, and personages found in the RCA. The art of narration and the dramatization I used to create rich descriptions are inherent in narrative inquiry as they illuminate the reciprocal relationship between recognizing, interpreting, and constructing my archival process at the RCA. Each archive story concludes with a summary of the main themes that occurred along my archival journey, which I consequently link back to the archival theories explored in the literature review (see chapter II). As the readers of the following chapters experience my stories, I hope that they can also begin imagining their own stories and the connections between our stories. Further, I hope I have opened possibilities for those historians searching for new inroads into dance within American education, specifically within a college for women at the turn of the twentieth century.

IV. Archive Story I The Strongest Girl in Radcliffe

T HE F IRST V ISIT TO THE R ADCLIFFE C OLLEGE ARCHIVES It is late August 2010, and I determinedly approach—for the very first time—the Schlesinger Library (SL) located in the Radcliffe Yard, one out of over ninety Harvard University libraries, which holds the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA).21 The SL is located at the corner of Brattle and James Streets—the physical address is 3 James Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts—and the blinking red dot on my “HarvardU Map” iPhone navigation application tells me that I am about to approach my destination. I carry a laptop strung over my right shoulder in a military-green bag, which is also large enough to hold a giant folder reserved for the storage of archival material that I expect to photocopy during my visits. Despite the fact that the folder is still empty, carrying the weight of a 15-inch MacBook Pro causes an immediate strain on

21 It is difficult to determine the exact count of Harvard’s libraries, because the Harvard University Library is a library system rather than a library. A Guide to the Harvard University Library states that the collections are housed in over 90 libraries, most located in Cambridge and Boston, but others as distant as Washington, D.C., and Florence, Italy.

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my spine, and I am glad to view the entrance to the Radcliffe Yard. It is an extremely hot summer day in Cambridge, but I would take 94 degrees Fahrenheit any day over those freezing temperatures of the New England winter. However, as soon as I open the double-door to the airconditioned library building, I feel an arctic plunge in temperature, which instantly reminds me of Tim Padfield’s and Poul Klenz Larsen’s observation that, “archives are best kept cool” (215).22 After presenting my Harvard ID card to the female staff member, who is dutifully guarding the entrance to the staircase that leads to RCA, I head eagerly towards the stairs to begin my archival research. I am excited to get started, but before I set foot on the first step of the stairs, the library employee calls me out and firmly reminds me that it is university policy to store all my belongings in a locker. She seems to be less interested in my laptop. I can carry that upstairs, but my folder—still empty—is supposed to be securely locked away before I am allowed to proceed to the second floor. As the library holdings at the SL are non-circulating and cannot be taken out of the building, the need to police the materials that enter and leave the building is crucial. While I obediently store my bag in the locker, the receptionist nods approvingly in agreement. Before I close the door of the locker, I slide my iPhone into the back pocket of my jeans—just in case I need it. Now, I am cleared to go. A few moments later, I find myself—rather isolated—at the information desk on the second floor of the SL. As the desk is unattended, I anxiously look right and left in the hope of finding a librarian who can assist me. I flick my head around when a friendly female voice approaches me from behind: “Good morning. How can I help you?”

22 In “Low Energy Air-Conditioning of Archives,” an article that deals with issues of climate control in archives, the authors included a caricature of a film archive, air-conditioned at -20° C, in which an visibly-freezing archivist—accompanied by a dog holding a film container between his teeth— complains that “We must find a better retrieval system—Dogma can’t smell in the cold” (Padfield and Klenz Larsen 215).

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“Um, yes. Good morning. I’m Thom Hecht . . . and I am here to conduct primary research for my doctoral dissertation about . . . um . . .” I take a deep breath before I anxiously finish the sentence, “. . . the history of dance at Radcliffe College.” The librarian smiles at me, “Yes, I remember your topic. You emailed me a few months ago, right? I am glad you are on location now. My name is Sandy. Are you looking for any specific material today?”23 Before I can reply, Sandy continues, “Let me show you the library search engine, I am sure we can help you find what you are looking for.” But what exactly am I looking for? I briefly explain that I would like to explore the RCA in search of stories of dance as an extracurricular activity at Radcliffe College. However, rather than attempting to reconstruct the history of dance at Radcliffe, I hope that my archival journey will bring new ways of knowing dance as an extracurricular activity in a twentieth-century, higher educational setting, knowledge which I will portray through narrating my experience in the archive. “This sounds fascinating. Let’s get you started,” says Sandy while she walks towards one of the four computer stations reserved for online catalogue searches. She explains that, “The Radcliffe College finding aids have been digitized and are available through this system. I suggest that you first search for box type material using “danc*” as a keyword. Adding “*” to your search term will help to find as many results as possible. Leave the selection defaulted to anywhere. Use the drop down menu to select Schlesinger as the Repository. Click on search. Et voilà . . .” Under Sandy’s watchful eye, I begin to type “danc*” and the computer tells me that I have 164 results. I smile at Sandy who encourages me to scan through the results. “Let me know if you need any help,” she says, before she goes back into her office. “Remember that due to space restrictions, not all of the Schlesinger's holdings can be housed

23 Sandy is a fictitious name and the conversation is not quoted directly, but gives a sense of the generosity she demonstrated during my research at the SL.

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on-site. A portion of the library's book, periodical, and manuscript collections are stored at the Harvard Depository, a facility outside of Cambridge. Materials are retrieved from the depository upon request through a delivery service. Normally, the retrieval time is less than thirty-six hours. The good news is that there is no charge to readers for this service. Enjoy the search!” After this short induction session, I spend the rest of the morning pondering OASIS, the library’s Online Archival Search Information System, in search of “danc*.”24 The finding aids, which are documents containing detailed information about a specific collection of papers or records within an archive, instantly become my new best friends. Despite this newly emerging friendship—which proves to be crucial when navigating through the online catalogue—my visit to the SL, and especially OASIS, genuinely challenges my patience. This is not due to any fault of the library staff as each one is extremely helpful in explaining the finding aids and search engines, but because often the archival sources I request are stored off-site. Two-and-a-half hours later, OASIS reminds me of a literal oasis, an isolated area of vegetation in a desert, but in the gestalt of a library. However, this place of isolation is not surrounded by a comforting, bubbling spring of water; indeed, there are no archival sources of dance in immediate reach of my lone desk. Anyone who ever tried to locate specific archival material knows how taxing it can be to request box after box, and to wait for them to be delivered from the off-site repository to the library facility. At this point, I realize that my “archive dances”—the term coined for my archival search—will be an extended journey “along and against the grain” (127), as Patricia Whatley and Caroline Brown call the philosophy and politics of identifying, selecting, and preserving archives and

24 OASIS (Online Archival Search Information System) provides centralized access to a growing percentage of finding aids for archival and manuscript collections at Harvard. These finding aids are detailed descriptions of collections that contain a wide variety of materials, including letters, diaries, photographs, drawings, printed material, and objects.

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archival material. My interrogative and self-reflexive methodological journey at the RCA has begun, but not in the manner of the easy waltz I imagined. Instead, I find that dance as a cultural artifact at the SL appears to be exclusively stored at an off-site facility, or at least, this is my first impression. “Could I have this archive dance?” is literally put on hold, as it seems that I will have to wait for boxes of source material to be delivered to the physical archive.

A C HANCE E NCOUNTER : F INDING E LEANOR S TABLER B ROOKS As I wander restlessly around the online catalogue of the RCA in search of dance stories, I learn that I have to be patient and listen to where the archive leads me, an approach that historian Robert Connors described in his essay, “Dreams and Play: Historical Method and Methodology,” as “a kind of directed ramble” and “August mushroom hunt” (23). Faced with the Harvard libraries search engines, a format with which I am still gaining familiarity and navigational skills, I search for source materials containing the keyword “danc*” in the hope that this vague and broad search term might turn up something which opens the door into a possible archive story. While I am thrilled that my search on OASIS suggests that there are factually hundreds of results, to my frustration, however, I can only make educated guesses of what historical fragments to expect in the boxes and folders that appear on my computer screen—listed as collection numbers—from this open-ended search strategy. But which collections, boxes, and folders shall I order? In fact, I don’t know which “mystery box” will hold the information that would lead me into a clear direction. However, after further rambling through OASIS, which brings up numerous materials emerging from my initial methodological approach of searching for anything that might be remotely related to dance, I finally stumble onto my first archive story of dance that looks promising: “Eleanor Stabler Brooks,” a 1914 Radcliffe College alumna, who

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was an athlete, a gymnast, and a dancer. As the finding aid indicates, her college scrapbook 1910-1914 (ESB Series III, 12f ) contains clippings of newspaper reports on athletic and gymnastic achievements, invitations to dance events, as well as pamphlets on athletics, gymnastics, basketball, dance, and theater programs. This appears to be exactly what I was hoping to find. I fill out a manuscript and archival material request form, a pink slip, which I hand over to Sandy. “You are lucky. ‘Eleanor’ is stored on-location,” confirms Sandy. “Often collections are donated by family members,” Sandy explains. “It looks like this material has been processed recently. The finding aid indicates that Eleanor Morse and Frona Brooks Vicksell gave the collection to the Radcliffe College Archives between October and December 2002. It will take a couple of minutes to get the box for you. Why don’t you just wait here . . . I will be back shortly.” I feel signs of relief and satisfaction that my travel through OASIS led me to an “archival oasis” in which actual historical material might satisfy my thirst for dance stories at Radcliffe College. Although I don’t know what exactly I will find in the box, I feel a sense of accomplishment—and I am excited to get my hands on “history,” a history that allows me to dance with/in the archives. It’s almost like putting together the first pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, although I know that this is merely the beginning of a long journey into this very complicated puzzle. While I comb over the individual items listed for Eleanor in the finding aid, I attempt to develop a sense of what I will do with the archival material once the box is delivered to the reading room. At this point, I have little idea that my encounter with Eleanor’s scrapbook will shape my methodological approach of making meaning not only about the history of dance and physical education at Radcliffe College—which is merely a point of departure—but also concerning costume history, specifically the sportswear worn during Eleanor’s daily college life, a theme that will also accompany me during another archive story (see chapter VI). Before my mind wanders off, Sandy’s says, “Please follow me in the Reading Room, which is used exclusive-

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ly for the examination of library holdings,” as she points towards the glass door at the other end of the room. Although the reading room is filled with sunlight—making it appear bright and welcoming, the cold blast of air from the air conditioning makes me feel chilly despite the fact that I put on a sweater. As Sandy hands me a pencil and a blank piece of paper, she informs me that, “There is no self-service copying of any library material, but you may request copies to be made. This can get very expensive, and most scholars use digital cameras for note-taking purposes.” I glance anxiously at Sandy: “Um . . . I don’t have a digital camera . . . but would my iPhone work?” “Yes,” she replies, enthusiastically raising her voice. “In fact, we just had a scholar last week who photographed all her material with an iPhone.” Relieved that I don’t need to spend money on the purchase of a digital camera, I pull out my iPhone from the back pocket of my jeans. Elatedly, I glimpse at the yellow paper box that is sitting in front of me: “ESB Series III, 12f: Eleanor Stabler Brooks.” This simple box signals the start of my first hands-on experience with RCA material and I can’t wait to open its contents. As a trained costume and fashion historian I am used to handling archival material with gloves, but Sandy explains that, “You don’t need to wear gloves, but be careful when you handle the material. Some of the material might be really fragile.” Then she leaves the reading room and I am on my own. The absolute silence in the reading room makes me contemplate my archival journey through the SL: I learn that being there physically, both in the RCA as well as in a building that is situated in the Radcliffe Yard, is invaluable to my research. While it seems convenient to electronically search the archives from any remote location, there are many primary sources relevant to my research—if not all—that I cannot access online. While I have access to finding aids, which summarize archival materials in a condensed manner, the access to the actual primary sources is only open to scholars who can consult the materials on location. Further, as far as I can tell in this early stage of my research, being in physical contact with the archives makes me feel more connected to my historical subjects: Being in this location means that I can

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walk—literally—in the footsteps of the women at Radcliffe College.25 One of these women is now Eleanor. As I learn shortly, Eleanor was considered “the strongest girl in Radcliffe College,” and that much of her time was spent at the Radcliffe gymnasium. From my desk in the reading room, I catch a glance of the Radcliffe gymnasium, a view that seems to bring history back to life and to make my archival journey more authentic. With Eleanor’s materials collected provocatively in front of my eyes, I remember the cautions of the historian John Randolph, whose work I read—among many other archival theorists—in preparation for my doctoral qualifying exams and dissertation research. Indeed, Randolph states that, “One might attempt to understand one’s own archival experience by interrogating the history of the archive’s hosting institution” (210), questioning which helps to situate an archive story within a historical context. Taking Randolph’s advice into account, I briefly “back pedal”—at least in my mind—to recall Radcliffe’s institutional history (see Chapter I), before I anxiously begin to open the lid of the box. Many questions pop up in my mind: What kind of dance materials will I find in the collection? How will Eleanor Stabler Brooks fit into the historical picture of Radcliffe College? What aspects of dance were collected, what simple clues will I find, what unexpected leads will I encounter, and how can I interpret these archival sources within the historical context of dance education at a private woman’s college? What follows next, is an attempt to sketch my archival journey of and with “Eleanor” as I begin approaching my whirling questions.

25 Despite my excitement of being physically on location, I appreciate the advantages of digitized finding aids, which allows me to view—at least in an abbreviated form—historical content before I decide to request the archival materials.

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H OW C AN I I NTRODUCE E LEANOR TO Y OU ? As far as I can tell from the information on OASIS, the Eleanor Stabler Brooks (ESB) collection is rather vast, though I soon begin to realize that the scope of my research would be limited due to the restricted access: “Unrestricted papers (up to and including 1935) may be copied in accordance with the library's usual procedures. No copying is permitted of the closed papers (1936-1959) until Jan 1, 2030.” To my relief, I learn that the archival materials of Eleanor’s college years are unrestricted, which means that I can “dance”—almost literally—in Eleanor’s footsteps at Radcliffe College. Let me introduce Eleanor with a brief biographical summary, which I gather from the finding aid: Daughter of Edward Lincoln Stabler and Elizabeth Tubby Stabler, was born September 9, 1892. The Stablers were Quakers and lived first in Brooklyn, N.Y., and then in Greenwich, Conn. Eleanor attended Radcliffe, graduated, Phi Beta Kappa, summa cum laude in biology in 1914, and was the winner of the Jonathan Fay Prize. At Harvard she met Charles Franklin Brooks, meteorologist (Harvard A.B. 1911, A.M. 1912, Ph.D 1914) and they married in June 1914.26

Although the primary goal of my research is to search for stories of dance at Radcliffe College, I am struck that the finding aids’ summaries conclude with Eleanor’s marriage rather than putting the focus on Eleanor’s curricular or extracurricular achievements and activities at

26 Charles Franklin Brooks (1891-1958) was the son of Morgan Brooks, professor of engineering at the University of Illinois-Urbana and Frona Marie Brooks, who did graduate work at the Harvard Annex (later Radcliffe College), 1884-1886. Frona and Morgan Brooks had eight children, five of whom attended Radcliffe and Harvard including their daughter Frances Brooks Colcord, classmate of Eleanor Stabler Brooks.

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Radcliffe College. I remind myself that in order to make a claim about the past, I must see the information given within the context of its surrounding culture and history. Most importantly, historical evidence cannot be solely judged from the context of one’s own individual and cultural values. Hence, I feel I need to get a clearer sense of what was the purported purpose of college for women students during the turn of the last century, the time period during which Eleanor had been admitted to Radcliffe. “Dancing back and forth,” as I refer to the process of building connections between the archival material, the review of existing historical research, and the context it provides my material, is essential for the creation of my archival narrative. It helps me to rethink my analytical approach and put the found sources into a contextual focus, a focus that may shift and even prove to be paradoxical at times. To contextualize the above biographical information, it is important to remember that at the turn of the century, one expressed mission of women’s colleges—found in much of the literature—encompassed the fulfillment of a social status-maintenance, “making educational credentials for women valuable cultural currency in the marriage market” (Durbin and Kent 2-3). Indeed, Ivy-League college-educated women were known as eloquently conversant in a variety of liberal arts subjects, enabling them to perform proficiently in varied social settings. Hence, women students made attractive wives, particularly to men of high social or educational status, as Eleanor’s marriage to Charles Brooks might seem to demonstrate. It is not surprising then, that women’s colleges were often considered as “finishing schools” (Durbin and Kent 2), where “at formal teas and on other social occasions, women practiced the arts of proper dressing, good manners, and polite conversation” (2). Indeed, Patricia Albjerg Graham puts forth that, “Unlike the nineteenth century’s prescriptive behavior for women, the twentieth century’s was not in conflict with college attendance. [. . .] College was frequently considered the ideal place to meet the one with whom the domestic life would be shared” (770). Further, in Making Harvard Modern, Morton Keller and Phyllis Keller observe that, “Corporation secretary David Baily noted in 1963 that more than a quarter of Rad-

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cliffe undergraduates were married to Harvard men and that 18.3 percent of Radcliffe’s undergraduates were the daughters of alums” (277). Eleanor’s marriage in 1914—the year of her graduation from Radcliffe College—confirms that these kinds of relationships between Radcliffe and Harvard students did develop. In the light of this historical contextualization, I gain a better understanding of the decision made by archivists to include Eleanor’s marriage to a Harvard graduate in her biographical file. The resources within the archive clearly demonstrate how marital status was worthy to document as an “achievement” and important event during Eleanor’s college years. Historian Barbara Miller Solomon discusses further how college education often filled the interim period between adolescence and married adulthood with a socially respectable activity for young women, whether it was preparation for a temporary career—primarily in teaching—or the pursuit of a liberal education for the purpose of creating well-rounded, educated women who are well prepared to enter the marriage market. Indeed, the archival material of the ESB collection contains family correspondence between Eleanor and Charles— mostly post-marriage from 1914 onwards—with both restricted and unrestricted access.27 As I am primarily interested in Eleanor’s college years, I am reluctant to follow up on material generated beyond her graduation from Radcliffe College in 1914. However, I cannot help and notice the large volume of archival material that documents Eleanor’s life as a married woman, which was her “main career” after graduating from Radcliffe. While I do not further pursue this avenue of research, I realize that this topic has the potential to open up research opportunities for future historians, those interested in the lives of Radcliffe students after they graduate. The process of “dancing back and forth” between other scholars’ work concerning the archival process and the cultural and historical contexts of Eleanor’s life as well as my own archival explorations is essential as I trace the complex puzzle patterns in my contin-

27 Any correspondence after 1936 is closed until January 1, 2030.

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ued archival journey. It is, practically speaking, impossible for me to follow up all the leads into the diverse trajectories that I continue to discover while perusing Eleanor’s material; therefore, I choose to follow only those leads I sense are related to Eleanor’s connection with dance or her broader involvement in structured physical exercises and activities at Radcliffe. However, in choosing to limit myself to only certain aspects of Eleanor’s interests, I know I have also limited how the context and larger historical picture of Eleanor’s life can take on its full “aliveness” and show her as a complex young woman within a culture that was constantly changing over time. As an archival researcher, I must try to create with clarity those details that are available to me through the resources I find with the hope of provoking the reader to imagine Eleanor as she created her own dancing and physical education life while she was a student at Radcliffe College during the 1910s.

T HE F IRST L EAD : “S AID M INE W OULD D O ” When I open the ESB box, Eleanor’s crumbling scrapbook (ESB Series III, 12f) reminds me that I am dealing with history that happened more than a century ago. Time has taken its toll on Eleanor’s scrapbook: humidity caused the paper to wrinkle, discolor, and lose its flexibility. The scrapbook is in an over-sized format, and before I can even ask, Sandy provides me with a special bookstand, a padded device, which supports over-sized archival materials. I am grateful for the bookstand, as it allows the material to be fully supported while laid out, which could be a problem for some very odd shaped or over-sized documents. “The scrapbook seems to be really fragile, but if you photograph the pages you need instead of requesting photocopies, it should fine. You know, some documents are too old to be photocopied, but, one day, we hope to have them all available as digital files . . . but not any time soon,” says Sandy while she helps me to put the scrapbook on the device. When Sandy leaves the reading room—much to my dismay—I feel nervous being left alone with the scrapbook, a tangible and very

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real part of Eleanor’s history at Radcliffe College. At the same time, I am thrilled that the scrapbook offers me a glimpse of the picture Eleanor created about her exciting journey during her college years, in which she collected her memories of Radcliffe. When I open Eleanor’s scrapbook, a small booklet, which seemed to be glued to the left-hand side on the first page, becomes detached. In a split second, I feel a heat rush starting to come up, turning my cheeks and then the rest of my face scarlet. The thought of having damaged the scrapbook terrifies me. But what appears to be at first a sad moment—sad, because I feel somehow responsible for the condition of the crumbling and partially torn scrapbook—turns out to be a false alarm: The booklet and the scrapbook page are still in a solid condition with no visible signs of damage. What is even more important, however, is that the booklet which almost fell into my lap, represents my first “intimate” encounter with Eleanor. Beginning with her freshman year, Eleanor started the habit of pasting copies of registration cards, timetables, and dance cards into the scrapbook, some of which are annotated in Eleanor’s handwriting.28 I am elated to discover that the booklet, which almost seems to have fallen by fate, contains a handwritten annotation. As a trained fashion and costume historian, I will never forget this annotation— written with a sharp pencil—copied next to the “Instructions for Registration,” a small booklet that reminded Radcliffe students to make appointments for Dr. Bond’s and Miss Wright’s physical examinations and to take measurements for their gymnasium suits. Eleanor’s clear writing simply stated: “Said mine would do” (ESB Series III, 12f). Finding the annotation marks an important moment in my research. I sense in these few words that here might be an opening into seeing a

28 I am grateful for her truly beautiful handwriting, a skill that certainly came from disciplined practice, which made it relatively easy to read through her annotations and letters. The attention to handwritten notes appears to taper off during the years, especially during her sophomore and junior year, where her scrapbook shows considerable gaps between entries.

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connection between Eleanor’s measurements, her proposed interest in athletic activities, and her clothing for those activities. Indeed, I begin to read this brief encounter as a statement relating to the history of sports clothing: My initial interpretation of the annotation is that Eleanor had brought her own suit and that Radcliffe found it appropriate. It is thrilling to imagine that Eleanor’s statement presents an archival finding that possibly opens new paths into interdisciplinary research, a trajectory that had previously propelled my scholarly work.29 While I am excited to re-discover this connection, I am also hesitant to pursue this lead. Is it a chance encounter that I find fashionrelated evidence in Eleanor’s scrapbook? Am I finding clothing history as the predominant context of Eleanor’s statement because of my own “lived experiences” in the academic discipline of fashion history? Once again, I realize how the interests and the interpretations of the archivist might shape the meaning of the resources at hand. The key is for me to point out what might be exciting possibilities without stating them as the only reading of the material. This approach is similar to Gesa E. Kirsch’s and Liz Rohan’s observation on the importance of archival research as exciting and inspiring scholarly activity. In their anthology, Beyond the Archives, they ar-

29 Initially, I trained in classical ballet, but I was also drawn to fashion, and thus, I entered a graduate program in fashion marking and communication at ESMOD in Paris, France. Upon graduation, I returned to Germany and worked as a fashion journalist in Frankfurt, but soon I was eager to continue my studies. After graduating with a master’s degree in fashion history and theory from London College of Fashion in London, England, I became an Associate Lecturer for Cultural and Historical Studies. At the same time, I returned to my passion for the performing arts and I completed a master’s degree in performance practices at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama as well as a research degree in dance education at London Contemporary Dance School. During this time period, I published several essays and book chapters exploring the relationship between the body, dance, and fashion, an eclectic topic that still fascinates me until the present day.

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gue that this form of archival methodology “illustrates the importance of tapping into our passions, pursuing research subjects that attract our attention, and allowing creativity and intuition to enter the scholarly research process while broadening what ‘counts’ as an archive” (9). Indeed, my excitement does give me the momentum and the desire to follow my own interests in this lead. Although at this point I am very anxious to find out more about Eleanor’s uniform and the meaning of “Said mine would do,” I feel that I need some kind of background information for it to make sense. Thus, I decide that it is now vital to search out more information about the physical education program before I ponder what kind of uniforms would be needed to do these activities. As I am lost in these thoughts, I suddenly hear Sandy’s voice grabbing my attention with a forthcoming, “How is it going? Did you find anything exciting? I just want to let you know that we will close in about an hour,” I realize that I have spent most of my day searching for this first lead, a small breadcrumb that might lead to new ideas. However, as a costume and fashion historian, this time consuming search process is deeply important to me, as it opens up how archival research can not only bring life to history, but can also show how looking at the archived life of one person can open new connections and paths for discovery into aspects of the values of the broader culture. Eleanor’s annotation opens up the complexity of human life rather than confining it to a set place in history. I recognizeß that human life cannot be placed within historical boundaries or historic disciplines, but rather it jumps through any of the boundaries set up by the historian. Before I must leave the SL, which closes at 5 pm, I pull out my iPhone and take photographs of Eleanor’s provocative annotation. Capturing my library findings seems to be vitally important for my continued archival journey as this form of visual documentation provides a more accountable basis for my research: it allows me to re-visit my experience—and visual memory—from any remote location. Hopefully, these photographs of historical evidence form one of the foundations, a

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visual reminder, from which I will be able to narrate my own archival stories.

E LEANOR ’ S G YMNASIUM S CHEDULE : ADVANCED -L EVEL C LASSES The next morning, when I enter the Radcliffe Yard through the Sunken Garden entrance from Appian Way, I become aware once again of the Radcliffe Gymnasium, one of the eight buildings that surround the yard. When one enters the yard through the Sunken Garden, which is right of Longfellow Hall if you are looking at it from Appian Way, one will inevitably notice the Radcliffe Gymnasium straight ahead. In contrast to Harvard Yard, which due to its much larger size feels more intimidating and imposing, the atmosphere in Radcliffe Yard is more intimate as the surrounding buildings are less heavy than those of the historically masculine Harvard University. In particular, I enjoy the serenity of the Sunken Garden, as it feels inviting and calm, and I wonder what sort of feeling might the yard have given a young woman moving away from home for the first time. The original 1898 Radcliffe Gymnasium served its function for many generations of Radcliffe students and, certainly, Eleanor would have used it many times. It is also likely that Eleanor entered the Radcliffe Yard many times through the Sunken Garden entrance to go to the gymnasium. My experience of entering the yard exemplifies Gesa E. Kirsch’s and Liz Rohan’s thought of the importance of visiting the geographical location of where a historical figure lived. Kirsch and Rohan state that, “Exploring a place and reseeing a place as an archive teach the hands-on nature of research. This method of research is intricately linked with living, being present both mindfully and physically” (5). Indeed, when I pass the gymnasium, it almost feels like walking—literally—in Eleanor’s footsteps, and I realize how much I hope that my research will give her a living presence in my archive stories.

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After my check-in at the front desk—an already familiar procedure—I spend the rest of the morning in the reading room. Sandy had put the ESB collection on hold, which means that I can immediately start to burrow through Eleanor’s historical evidence. Still intrigued by Eleanor’s gym suit annotation, I am keen to find out more about the physical education, gymnastics, and dance offerings during Eleanor’s college years at Radcliffe College. The process of questioning the booklet is crucial for my archival journey and I take sufficient time to read through the document. While I hope that I will find more handwritten annotations, I am disappointed. I seemingly hit some dead ends in my research, or this is my first impression. To take another track, I try to gain a closer look at the booklet to discover how registration was handled at the Radcliffe gymnasium. What classes were offered and what was Eleanor’s schedule? This might help me picture Eleanor moving within the gymnasium I had just passed that morning. The “Instructions for Registration” (ESB Series III, 12f) reveal that Radcliffe students were told to meet with Miss Wright, the Director of the Gymnasium, on Thursday, September 29, 1910, between 11:00 a.m. and 12 noon in the gymnasium to register for physical education classes. The course offerings ranged from elementary to advanced classes in dancing, folk dancing, games, gymnastics, and Swedish gymnastics. Students who elected dancing had the choice of registering “for three periods of dancing or for two periods of dancing and one or two periods of gymnastics” (ESB Series III, 12f). This schedule allowed Radcliffe Students to be physically active from Monday through Saturday. For example, the “Elementary 1” class in Swedish gymnastics and games met Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 3:30 p.m.; the “Elementary 2” class, intended for “students who are physically unable to take (1) or who need special exercises” met Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 9 a.m. (ESB Series III, 12f). Although the class description does not state the explicit content of these “special exercises,” it is reasonable to assume that classes were based on the Sargent system (see chapter VI for a more detailed description of the Sargent System that was instituted at Harvard in the late nineteenth century).

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With the passing of each hour in the reading room, my archival journey feels more like detective work as I attempt to reconstruct Eleanor’s athletic schedule. Shuffling through the historical evidence provided through Eleanor’s “Instructions for Registration” (ESB Series III, 12f) is gratifying and daunting at the same time and it certainly feels pleasurable to engage with the archival material. Even if sources of information are incomplete, a more detailed picture begins to emerge as I make connections between numerous seemingly random facts. However, it still feels disheartening to deal with archival gaps. Nevertheless, my enthusiasm for continuing my momentum propels me forward as I begin to make meaningful connections within the many possibilities emerging from the data—emerging from the registration booklet—in front of me. When looking very closely at Eleanor’s “Instructions for Registration,” I notice a “tick” next to the upper-level classes at the gymnasium. My assumption is that these “ticks” indicate classes of interest to Eleanor and that—as these were all upper level classes—Eleanor must have been a rather experienced athlete when entering Radcliffe College in 1910. Whereas “Advanced 1” classes were intended for “students who have had the equivalent of one year’s work in the Radcliffe Gymnasium, before entering the College” (ESB Series III, 12f), I assume that “ticks” in blue ink next to the most advanced upper-level classes indicate Eleanor’s athletic ambitions. If I read the “tick” as a confirmed enrollment, it seems that Eleanor was registered for the “Advanced 2” class, which met Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday at 10 am. In addition, she was also enrolled in “Advanced 3,” the continuation of “Advanced 1” and “Advanced 2,” which met on Monday at 11am. As the “Dancing” class offerings clashed with the “Advanced” offerings, it is reasonable to assume that Eleanor would not have been able to register for them at the same time.30 I am very curious to find out more about

30 “Dancing 1” was offered on Wednesday and Friday, as well as Tuesday and Thursday at 11 am for students who had successfully completed Ad-

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the nature of the dancing classes at the time when Eleanor attended Radcliffe, but no indications are given in the booklet. Although I realize that this historical evidence only scratches the surface of what this time period or Eleanor’s registration event was like, it gives me a valuable context to ponder what kind of uniforms would be needed to do these physical activities.

E LEANOR ’ S G YM S UIT : C LOTHING FOR P HYSICAL E DUCATION The following day, in the spirit of archival enthusiasm in which I explore the myriad of research possibilities, I decide to go back to Eleanor’s annotation “Said mine would do,” which fell into my lap just a few days ago. Given the historical context of the birth of clothing for women devised for exercise in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, I wonder if Eleanor meant that her gym suit’s measurements—a suit she probably brought with her to college from home— would do for Radcliffe College. Indeed, gym suits were an essential piece of clothing for students in women’s colleges in the early twentieth century. As Patricia Campell Warner, author of When the Girls Came Out to Play, puts forth: Indeed, what choices did she have? And how did the clothing that eventually emerged for exercise relate to the dress worn outside the educational environment, perhaps for playing one of the new games that became so popular at the same time? The links between sports, clothing, and women’s higher education are profound, entwined to the point of fusion. (XIX)

vanced (1) or its equivalent before entering College. “Dancing 2” was offered on Monday, and Wednesday at 2 pm.

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In this light, Eleanor’s handwritten annotation, “Said mine would do,” is not only telling that she was vividly interested in physical activities that necessitated appropriate attire for women, but also demonstrates that it was likely that she had owned a gym suit when entering Radcliffe College. Indeed, during the early twentieth century, gym suits represented uniform clothes that were worn by thousands of women since the emergence of the popular health-exercise movement in the latter half of the nineteenth century. I wonder what Eleanor’s gym suit looked like and if I could find a photograph. When I spot Sandy the librarian at the information desk, I am delighted to share my archival path with her. Sandy, who is a keen listener, offers—upon my request—to locate images of Eleanor. While Sandy explains the image search system, “You can use VIA to search for photographs. VIA is the acronym for Visual Information Access, a system that is a union catalog of visual resources at Harvard focusing on artistic and cultural materials,” I am hopeful that a picture of her gym suit will turn up. I learn that VIA includes catalog records for objects or images owned, held or licensed by Harvard University. Access to the catalog is open to the general public: all catalog records and thumbnail images are available to everyone. Access to higher resolution images is usually available only to the Harvard community. However, it is always determined by an individual repository, and is often dependent on copyright. Access to an original object or image is determined by the individual repository, in my case the SL. Typically, restrictions on access may be noted in the VIA record. While I hold my breath, I realistically cannot expect to find a photograph of Eleanor’s gym suit in VIA. While the search turns out negative, at least for Eleanor, I come across a photograph that shows a gym suit that had survived. Although the image does not show Eleanor’s gym suit, but a curator holding up Edith Hall Plimpton’s gym suit from 1896, it still brings history alive, as I build a connection between Eleanor’s “Said mine would do” and the photograph.

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Figure 1: Edith Hall’s Gym Suit from 1896. Courtesy of the Radcliffe College Archives, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University (Radcliffe Archives TC 143-1-1).

The image shows Warren Little '55, Exhibit Coordinator for Harvard Varsity Club & Athletic Department holding up Edith Hall Plympton [sic] '96's black gym suit. 9.8.86.

Although I do not have any pictorial evidence of Eleanor’s gym suit, Edith Hall Plimpton’s black gym suit vividly helps me to visualize the garment: Typically, the turn-of-the-century gym suit was as a kneelength divided skirt worn with black stockings, intended for exercise only. In my quest to find published materials that shed light on the existence and use of gym suits at Radcliffe College, I find the words of historian Gloria Bruce, who, in her essay “Radcliffe Women at Play,”

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describes the Radcliffe College gymnasium bloomer as a “heavy, dark, and almost universally unflattering garment consisting of voluminous below-the-knee knickers” representing a “convenient symbol of Radcliffe’s struggle to define its young women as attractive, active yet controllable, well rounded but well aware of the boundaries between the sexes” (144). In fact, bloomers were restricted to the private sphere, while dresses—that is non-sports clothing—were required in public. As Patricia Campell Warner in “The Gym Suit: Freedom at Last” notes, “When there was a possibility that the students could be seen by the public, skirts were required” (157). In “Clothes Make the Man: Cross-Dressing on the Radcliffe Stage,” scholar Karen Lepri continues to pen new ways of thinking about how this sports fashion evolved. She writes that the Radcliffe administration was concerned that “open legs would lead to new freedoms and behaviors unacceptable for educated young women” (152). It is quite possible, then, that Eleanor’s annotation refers to how the physical measurements of the gym suit would do—rather than her own physical measurements—which appears to have found approval by Miss Wright and the Radcliffe administration. While this first path into the meaning of “Said mine would do” seems to represent a plausible explanation, I try not to cling too tightly to this assumption. As I continue to do more reading of women’s sports clothing, I learn that, although sports outfits became available readymade, many young women—even from the upper class—sewed their own. Hence, I begin to wonder whether Eleanor’s cryptic statement meant that the quality of her self-made uniform—rather than the physical measurements—would “do.” At this point, with only the annotation as historical evidence, I can only speculate whether her gym suit was a homemade garment, a store-bought suit, or was supplied by Radcliffe.31 However, it is an interesting conjecture in light of the fact that

31 According to Sarah A. Gordon, schools and other institutions that supported women's sports often expected participants to make their own gym suits.

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during the early 1900s, popular fashion magazines not only featured gym suits and explained how they were made, but also offered gym suit patterns (Campell Warner 153-4). Homemade sports garments allowed women to have control over both design and shape—within socially determined limitations—allowing them to adapt the pattern into a design that enabled them to move while exercising and playing sports. Whether homemade or store-bought, the gym suit enabled women to engage in organized physical activity bridging a “link between the feminine pursuit of drama and the more masculine realm of Radcliffe’s other most popular activity—sports” (Bruce 144). Hence, college women, like Eleanor, were among the first to benefit from the Dress Reform Movement, which brought the gym suit to the gymnasium and then to women’s educational institutions, one of which was Radcliffe College in the late nineteenth century.32 While I continue glancing at Eleanor’s annotation, I contemplate about yet another possible way to read her writing: Her body’s physical measurements are determined as adequate from the needs of women’s sports clothing and physical education programs. Indeed, I cannot rule out that Eleanor meant her physical measurements would do in terms of what clothing was needed to perform and participate in physical education. In this moment, I realize that I can only speculate as I explore aspects of Eleanor’s life, but I am fascinated by manifold potential interpretations of small historical traces that shape my curiosity and hence, my research. In fact, the crucial significance of reading archival sources in multiple ways is an important aspect of my work to narrate histories rather than history. While I will not be able to ever truly create a complete historical picture, my foray into the mystery gives me a

The source material at the Radcliffe College Archives, however, did not give any clues whether this was a requirement at Radcliffe College. 32 Related to this discussion is Karen Lepri’s observation in “Clothes Make the Man”: “As designers and moralists debated the question of how high bloomers should join between ladies’ legs, Radcliffe administrators battled over the propriety of pants in student plays” (152).

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way of exploring the broader context in which the annotation lives. More precisely, I recognize that specific historical facts, such as the gymnasium schedule, when situated in historical contexts, are essential for creating the larger picture of the history of dance at Radcliffe College.33

E LEANOR ’ S ATHLETIC AMBITIONS : T HE S TRONGEST G IRL IN R ADCLIFFE A few days later when I am back at the Schlesinger Library (SL), rifling through Eleanor’s material seems to have turned into a familiar process. I feel that I am developing a better sense of “hearing” what the archives tell me as Eleanor’s story slowly unfolds. Each hour I spend with the “Instructions for Registration” booklet I become more comfortable looking for possible connections to information found in my literature review. It becomes clearer that although gymnastic exercises

33 It is important to note that I spend a considerable amount of time reading secondary source material, which feeds into my literature review and methodology chapters (see chapter II and III). As the reading room at the SL is solely reserved for reading archival material, I have to find another place to work on my literature review. My initial plan to spend time at the Widener Library’s Pusey Stacks, where I would have to request a carrel, soon becomes obsolete when I realize that the Pusey Stacks are solely underground. Instead—initially out of curiosity—I end up the Harvard University Law Library at Langdell Hall, a colossal building that lets me see daylight while I am editing. Interestingly, Langdell Hall is also close to Harvard’s Hemenway Gymnasium, and I feel rather inspired to work in this particular environment. As I keep working on my literature review—while situating my primary sources into their context—there is a sense of energy to this process that makes my research feel authentic the deeper I dig.

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were still seen as the most effective activity to develop physical powers, Radcliffe College also offered a range of games and sports activities. Indeed, these team sports seem to function as a practical means to promote college spirit and develop positive and desirable social and character values in the students. Historian Gloria Bruce observes that the popularity of sports at Radcliffe College was forced to some degree, as “every student had to engage in some form of organized physical activity” (142). The “Instructions for Registration” brochure states: The Radcliffe Gymnasium and Field are open to all students of Radcliffe College. Systematic physical exercise is expected of entering students and is advised for all. During the fall and spring all students are required to take part in organized sports for two periods a week, or an equivalent which shall be satisfactory to the Director of the Gymnasium. During the winter, three periods a week in the Gymnasium are required.

Athletics—alongside dance and gymnastics—flourished at Radcliffe College, especially since the construction of the Hemenway Gymnasium in 1898. In particular, field hockey, group games (defined as ball games, running games, etc.), and tennis teams on the intramural and varsity level were encouraged. The offering was extensive: field hockey was offered during the month of October on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday from 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm, with special attention given to beginners on Monday; group games were held during October and after the April recess on Tuesday and Thursday from 2:30 pm to 3:30 pm, and on Wednesday from 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm; tennis was held during October and after the April recess by appointment; and swimming instructions in the gymnasium pool was given on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday from 9:30 to 4:30 pm34 (ESB Series III, 12f). Despite the manly nature of competitive sports, “Team games had undeniable benefits,” argues Gloria Bruce, as “They gave the wan bluestocking

34 It is unclear, whether swimming instructions were given daily or by appointment during these times.

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vigor, grave, and bloom while promoting the class spirit and ‘democracy’ that were a point of pride for women’s colleges” (142). The more I dig into Eleanor’s scrapbook, the more I learn about her athletic ambitions. Indeed, the scrapbook provides historical evidence that Eleanor had become very involved in athletic activities during her sophomore year at Radcliffe College (1911-12). Although Eleanor’s sophomore entries in the scrapbook are sparse in comparison to her freshmen year, her sophomore entries clearly revolve around athleticism. In fact, the majority of the scrapbook entries are related to athletic events, but entries that would give insights into her academic experience or non-athletic activities at Radcliffe appear to taper off dramatically. I can only assume that there was a change in Eleanor’s activities—possibly towards an increased engagement with athleticism—that prevented her from keeping up her scrapbook or she simply lost interest in doing the scrapbook. However, during her sophomore year, Eleanor had started to collect material that documented her athletic experience: invitations to athletic associations and newspaper articles about athletic events. Some of the articles were annotated in Eleanor’s handwriting indicating the date of an event, but, unfortunately, Eleanor never cited the source of the publication. The clippings are neatly glued into the scrapbook and appear to be in a chronological order, which I can verify by the chronology of the entries. However, I can only speculate about the nature of the newspaper publications. Given the strong focus on events at Radcliffe College, it is likely that these clippings were cut out from student newspapers. The variety of materials, chronologically glued into the scrapbook, allows me to create a picture of Eleanor’s strong interest in athletic activities rather than dance. For example, an entry appears to be a reminder note from the Radcliffe Athletic Association (R.A.A.), indicating in Eleanor’s handwriting that, “Practice in floorwork and marching for all classes will be held Wednesday, January 10th at 11:30. Please be punctual” (ESB Series III, 12f). One of the few dance examples represents a program annotated with Eleanor’s handwriting as “Our Gym

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Demonstration” (ESB Series III, 12f). The program shows the order of the presentation: “1. Gymnastic lesson. 2. Hungarian Folk Dance (Csehbogar). Dutch Folk Dance (Wooden Shoes). 3. Gymnastic Games. 4. Dances (Polka Boheme, Nobleman’s Dance, Russian, Caprice, Morris Dance Green Sleeves).” Although this program demonstrates that Radcliffe students learned and practiced a variety of cultural dances, I cannot find evidence to what extent Eleanor was involved in any of the dance activities. Although I feel slightly sidetracked—moving away from my initial goal of finding archival material of dance at Radcliffe—Eleanor’s interest in athletic activities provides a much richer collection of materials helping me to further shape my research. I can now note how physical activity was a strong emphasis in the early twentieth century Radcliffe College and that dance, specifically what is considered folk dance, was one offering as part of this physical activity. Even though Eleanor was not interested, reading about her activities does help me indirectly imagine where dance fit into the curriculum – perhaps more as a physical activity rather than an art form? This question could lead me to more searches: Is dance related more to dramatic activities? Is there any mention of dance as a competitive activity in other resources? These questions will take me on a new path and can be considered after I have exhausted my exploration of Eleanor’s experiences of physical activity in Radcliffe College. Ultimately, after a few more hours of pondering Eleanor’s scrapbook, I find a series of sources —indeed more than I am hoping for— which shed light on Eleanor’s athleticism. One source, an unidentified newspaper clipping entitled “Miss Eleanor Merritt Stabler” (ESB Series III, 12f), describes Eleanor as “an accomplished athlete and in a recent contest she was declared to be the strongest girl in Radcliffe College.” The article describes Eleanor’s title as a “unique distinction” (ESB Series III, 12f). The newspaper clipping also reveals that Eleanor was the “captain of the sophomore gymnasium team” (ESB Series III, 12f), which confirms my speculations about her strong involvement in athletics at Radcliffe College. Then, when I discover a loose newspa-

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per clipping titled “Radcliffe Girls in Athletic Stunts” (dated Jan 21st, year and publication unknown) in Eleanor’s scrapbook, (ESB Series III, 12f), I literally jump up and down.35 The article describes the first meeting (of the academic year) of the Radcliffe Athletic Association, and Eleanor is identified as class leader in the athletic community at Radcliffe. This confirms my previous findings of Eleanor as captain of the sophomore gymnastics team and my assumption that Eleanor had become not only increasingly involved in athletics at Radcliffe College, but was also considered a leader in this field. The newspaper clipping further contributes to my understanding of the larger historical picture of the time period, one in which athletic accomplishment fulfilled the fostering of a Radcliffe College spirit. I also am provided a glimpse of dance and gymnastics demonstrations, which appear to be belong to those appropriate womanly activities that foster college pride. The article reads: In the exhibition of folk dancing between 1913 and 1914, the latter won 8 ¼ to 7 ¾. In the contest of aesthetic dancing between 1911 and 1912 the former won 9 to 7 ½. The basis of marking for all event was 10 as perfect” (ESB Series III, 12f).36

Although there is no indication of Eleanor’s involvement in the dance and gymnastics demonstration, I learn that Eleanor’s class of 1914 seems to be strong in folk dancing as they beat the class of 1913.

35 Although the newspaper clipping was loose, I could locate it within the sophomore year section of the yearbook due to the content and context of the article. However, I could not identify the title of the publication. 36 The years (1911, 1912, 1913, and 1914) indicate the expected graduation dates.

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Figure 2: Eleanor Stabler Brooks on a Skiing Vacation. Courtesy of the Radcliffe College Archives, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University (ESB Sub Series D, 6.31).

Although the EBS collection at the RCA is extensive, I can only locate a few pictures of Eleanor. Interestingly, none of Eleanor’s scrapbook entries focused on skiing, but yet, these are the only images I came across. When I discover, as part of my search, a series of photographs portraying Eleanor in a ski suit, it became clear that Eleanor’s athletic ability portrayed what Barbara Miller Solomon described as the “new image of the natural woman” (Miller Solomon 103), a woman who was proud to be seen playing sports.

The idea of a competitive dance demonstration seems fascinating, but Eleanor does not comment on this event in her scrapbook. Nevertheless, this clipping gives me insights into what might be dance education in women’s colleges during the early twentieth century: The lady-

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like nature of dance and gymnastics demonstration—despite its competitive character—was socially acceptable in the early 1900s, while at the same time, gymnastic exercising “performed the essential job of maintaining good health” (Bruce 143). What is even more interesting is that physical activity for women followed the competitive nature of men’s activity. The archival evidence suggests that dance was judged as a competitive sport—even aesthetic dancing—rather than as a performance to be critiqued in artistic terms. However, I do not know how or on what criteria these dance competitions were judged. That is still conjecture on the part of the archival researcher and possibly leads to other paths for future searching.

E LEANOR ’ S ATHLETIC S CHEDULE : H ER F ATHER D ISAPPROVES During my fourth week at the SL, I begin to feel more “seasoned” in the RCA: the receptionist knows my first name, the librarians are familiar with my research interests, and the library catalogue’s finding aids seem to be less intimidating than just a few weeks ago. I even become accustomed to the cool air conditioning in the reading room. Since I want to continue following Eleanor’s athletic achievements, I spend the next few days browsing through the finding aids of the ESB collection on OASIS looking for correspondence from or to Eleanor. While searching the online catalogue for letter correspondence, I stumble across a finding aid summary which remarks that, “Eleanor’s father disapproves of athletic schedule.” The document is held in off-site storage, and I have to wait until the morning to get access to the box. But when I finally try to find the document, it appears to be missing, or misfiled at least. I have no other choice than order all unrestricted boxes of Eleanor’s letter correspondence if I want to find this letter. For an entire week, I dig through more than a dozen boxes of the ESB collection; the letter appears to be misfiled. The volume of Eleanor’s letter correspondence and the time she—and her respondents—must have

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spent on writing letters stuns me. While I try to remember the last time I wrote a letter by hand, I remind myself that emailing and social networking—at least for me—has largely replaced any handwritten correspondence. As I go through the boxes, I am slightly overwhelmed by the volume of correspondence material of the ESB collection. Thus, for a systematic search, it is crucial to take explicit notes of the exact research path to avoid duplication of my searches. My interest in private correspondence is the guiding light that drives my research. With each day, my search becomes more routine: as soon as I arrive in the morning, I order two boxes that seem “promising,” although I don’t know what I can expect until I ultimately open the boxes. I define promising as “letter correspondence that took place during Eleanor’s college years.” Over the years, Eleanor had written and received a lot of letters, although the majority of the correspondence is dated well beyond her college years. The difficulty of locating a letter from a particular date is that Eleanor’s letters are grouped by correspondence partners rather than by year. They include letters from and to her mother, her father, or her fiancé/husband. This means that in any given box I would find letters dating from the early 1910s to the mid 1930s; correspondence after 1936 has restricted access until 2030. Although for the most part, the letters are in chronological order, occasionally, I would find a letter that was misfiled, which meant that I had to go through the entire box if I did not want to miss a letter that was written between 1910 and 1914. The SL policy allows patrons to order two boxes at a time only. While I wait for the boxes to be delivered—which, depending on the storage location, can take between thirty minutes and forty-eight hours—I feel my body, especially my lower back—getting stiff. Each time when Sandy informs me that, “Your boxes are here,” I anxiously follow her in the reading room and begin to examine the materials. Among these scattered letters, I am trying to find one from her father, who—according to the finding aid—disapproves of her extensive athletic schedule. Reading through handwritten letters is exhausting and

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time-consuming: dissolved ink, discolored paper, and illegible handwriting makes my eyes itchy. I am grateful for her mother’s neat handwriting, who seems to have written Eleanor almost daily. After a week of searching through dozens of letters, I locate the handwritten letter (ESB Sub Series D, 6.15), dated January 16, 1914 and I am ecstatic that I finally found what I have been searching for. Anyone who has ever tried to locate a specific document knows how strenuous—both emotionally and physically—this part of the archival experience can be. When I hold the letter in my hands, in which her father voices concerns that he did not approve of Eleanor’s “engaging in athletics excessively,” I instantly forget about the long hours I spent searching for it. I am euphoric to find this piece of information that helps me to paint a more detailed picture of Eleanor. Indeed, her father reminds Eleanor to use “sufficient judgment,” in particular if C.F.B (her fiancé) is “seriously offended by it.” He criticizes Eleanor’s being “intimidating to any of the girls” and expresses his disapproval of Eleanor “spending excessive time on athletics” that would seriously be better spent on “time for studies.” Her father also writes that he had called “Dr. Bierbaum,” to tell him that Eleanor had “nearly fainted,” but admits that the doctor thought that if athletics were executed properly, they [girls] “would probably be benefitted rather than injured” (ESB Sub Series III, 6.15). In saying so, Dr. Bierbaum echoes the common consensus among medical doctors that physical exercise for women was a positive, even necessary, development. Although the letter is very hard to read, mainly due to water stains that had diluted the ink, it gives me a good sense of how Eleanor’s father felt about her athleticism. It also confirms my assumption that Eleanor spent a great deal of time with athletic activities, which I had previously gathered from her scrapbook, although I could not find any records of her scholastic work that indicated that she was falling back in that arena. Although I can only speculate to what extent her father’s letter had any influence, if any at all, on Eleanor’s athletic schedule, it represents an important archival finding reflecting Eleanor’s fascination with more rigid exercise forms of movement. I have little doubt that Elea-

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nor’s strong interest in athletics was nurtured in the growing awareness of the health benefits of physical activity. Athletics—most likely more than dance and gymnastics—was the arena in which the “strongest girl in Radcliffe,” Eleanor, thrived and excelled.

M Y E NDING D ANCE ALONGSIDE E LEANOR I owe a great deal to Eleanor’s interest in athletics; her athletic journey became the major influence of how my research journey was shaped. I now realize that the limited source material on dance during Eleanor’s time directed me to “dance alongside Eleanor” rather than to “dance with her.” I adopted the metaphor of “dancing alongside Eleanor,” as I discovered how her foray into Radcliffe’s athletic program (the gymnasium schedule, the gym suit, the athletic achievements, and finally her father’s disapproval of Eleanor’s athletic endeavors) gave me insights into life at Radcliffe College. This life may not create a clear picture of dance, but it did help me catch a glimpse of how women’s education promoted a moving body as becoming a healthy body. Consequently, this development of movement as necessary for a young woman paved the way for dance education to emerge in tandem with the physical education curriculum. Eleanor’s movement experiences at Radcliffe College guided me to a rich collection of materials that, even though not directly related to dance, helped me gain a sense of one female student who was struggling to define how her body might move and be challenged to move in the early part of the twentieth century. After nearly spending a month with Eleanor, the lesson I learned from my archival encounter is the crucial significance of taking advantage of unexpected leads and chance encounters, probably the most exciting part of archival research for me. In this context, Peter Fritzsche wrote: Archives are not comprehensive collections of things, the effects left behind by the dead—material testaments—nor are they arbitrary accumulations of rem-

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nants and leftovers—garbage pits. The archive is the production of the heirs who must work to find connections from one generation to the next and thereby acknowledge the ongoing disintegration of the past. (185)

Fritzsche’s words certainly ring true for me. Searching the ESB collection led me in directions that I had not anticipated to explore in-depth. Yet, in my search for dance stories in the RCA, I could not neglect the myriad related archive stories unfolding from Eleanor’s physical activities. What also emerged from my “dance alongside Eleanor” was the process I was finding to chart my individual experience in the archives. In the time spent intensely reading, pondering, and interpreting the source material, I was also developing a method for telling not a story, but many stories as my life touched Eleanor’s. Rather than simply “writing history,” I now felt that the history of the strongest girl in Radcliffe came more alive through the reflective documentation of my own archival journey.

V. Archive Story II The Teacher Who Danced With Knives

T URNING O VER

A NEW

L EAF

In early October, on my way to the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) at Harvard University’s Schlesinger Library (SL), I notice the unbelievably rich color spectrum of the fall foliage, a vivid reminder that New England has four distinct seasons each with its own character and appeal. Walking along and noticing how the colors change from green to bright yellow and orange—the distinctive red-purple of the sugar maple being my favorite—I do not only admire the trees whose leaves have undergone the change, but I also view the “leaf-peeping tourists” who, much to my pleasure, marvel at the brilliance of the foliage’s color spectrum, both in the Harvard and in the Radcliffe Yard. Although foliage coloration occurs wherever trees are growing, I cannot remember fall colors so bright. In tune with the change of season, I also turn over a new leaf, literally, when I now leave “Eleanor Stabler Brooks” (see chapter IV) in search of new archival leads. As daylight hours shorten and temperatures cool leaving the air fresh and crisp, the air-conditioning in the SL building does not bother me as much as it did two months ago when I started my archival journey at the RCA. During this earlier time, my discovery of Eleanor, “the strongest girl in Radcliffe,” led me to look more closely at the sur-

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roundings of the Radcliffe Yard. In doing so, I created a feel for how Radcliffe might have been experienced by the students in the early 1910s. Further, I discovered insights into the view Eleanor saw as she walked to the gym where she spent so much of her time, an experience I soundly associate with the physical activities she participated in during her years at Radcliffe College. Although I entered Eleanor’s archived life with the goal of finding dance stories, I left her archival files realizing that dance as a specific subject, at least as I had defined it in my mind, was mentioned very rarely in the materials. Therefore, at this point in my study and based on my experience with Eleanor, I feel that I need to widen my net concerning how I think about dance at Radcliffe College; otherwise, I now suspect that I have hit a dead end in my initial goal. Thus, following Eleanor’s athletic, rather than dancing, footsteps, I hope that pursing archival traces of physical education at Radcliffe will indirectly advance my dissertation research. With this new tactic in mind, I select “Physical Education” as a keyword on OASIS with the primary goal to get as many hits as possible. This direction leads me immediately to a large collection that pops up on the screen of my laptop: “The Radcliffe College’s Department of Physical Education” (Radcliffe College. Dept. of Physical Education Records, 1901-1973; RG XV). Although I am pleased with the search engine’s result, the thought of sifting through more than seventy years of archival records in physical education presents a great challenge, a very time-consuming one, causing me to feel apprehensive about losing further track of dance. However, as I comb through the finding aid, I am relieved that the collection appears to be of a manageable size, containing four cartons, two file boxes, and one portfolio. The finding aid broadly summarizes its scope and content: The collection consists of material concerning athletics and similar activities at Radcliffe, including papers of the Physical Education Department, the Athletic Association, the Outing Club, the Office of Sports, Dance [emphasis added] and Recreation, and various teams and sports clubs. Among the papers are clip-

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pings, correspondence, lists and schedules, transmit books, the constitution and some minutes of the Athletic Association, and printed material. The only official records among the papers are some records of student participation and a few financial records. (Radcliffe College. Dept. of Physical Education Records, 1901-1973; RG XV).

My surprise upon discovering the Radcliffe College’s Department of Physical Education collection (DPE) is that I have accidently stumbled across a variety of dance sources that had found an archival home in this particular collection. In fact, among the many physical education sources in this collection, the finding aid indicates the existence of folders containing dance posters and programs (DPE RG XV Series 1, Carton 1, 25), dance bills 1941/42 (DPE RG XV Series 1, Carton 1, 26), dance correspondence 1939 (DPE RG XV Series 1, Carton 1, 27), dance choreography 1940 (DPE RG XV Series 1, Carton 1, 28), AfroAmerican dance and ballet (DPE RG XV Series 1, Carton 1, 29), general dance clippings (DPE RG XV Series 1, Carton 2, 30.), folk dancing 1961-63 (DPE RG XV Series 2, Carton 1, 19), modern dance 196365 (DPE RG XV, Carton 1, 30), and dance prior to 1959 (DPE RG XV, Series 2, Carton 1, 15). I am elated that the DPE collection is a literal dance treasure trove for me, and is not entirely devoted to popular physical activities such as hockey, tennis, or swimming as I had mistakenly believed. The DPE collection, except for the last three folders, appears to be an impressive collection of dance material created in the late 1930s and early 1940s. As soon as I fill out the archival material request form, I head to the door of the reading room, anxiously awaiting the arrival of the requested materials. As the finding aid indicates that the material is stored on-site in the SL, I do not have to wait for them to be delivered from an off-site facility, as was the case with most of the previous materials from the Eleanor Stabler Brooks collection. Two large boxes are presented to me with the finding aid showing that most of the DPE materials contained within were created in the late 1930s and early 1940s. However, I know little about why this particular time period dominates the collection. I ask Sandy the librarian,

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who I can see through the glass wall separating the reading room from the information desk, why she thinks this particular time frame of dance was so active. She responds: “I wish I could answer your question, but, unfortunately, I don’t have any additional information on this particular collection. What gets preserved in archival repositories is often arbitrary. I suggest that you go through the source material and see if you can find a common thread.” Before I head back to the reading room Sandy encourages me by saying, “Let me know if you find any leads and we take it from there.” Now I wonder even more what was deemed so significant about this time period that more than half a dozen folders were dedicated to a particular decade. Anxiously, I go back into the reading room, full of anticipation about a new archive story that eventually will unfold.

H OW I M EET K ATHARINE S CHROEDER Pulling out the first folder from a freshly delivered box is always the most exciting moment for me. If I stumble upon a great source early during the day, it lifts my spirits and encourages me to dig deeper. An added benefit of an early finding is also the discovery of potential leads, which often open my eyes to the eclectic possibilities of archival research. On the other hand, the absence of any promising material can be rather frustrating, especially if you are just beginning to search for new leads. To begin my archival journey with the DPE collection, I decide to flick through the Dance Correspondence 1939 folder (DPE RG XV Series 1, Carton 1, 27) first. As an archival researcher, I find myself drawn to correspondence, as these records are often more personal and give colorful daily life resources and insights that can further lead to new ways of imagining archival and historical research as academic scholarship. When I open the folder, I am elated that the majority of the letters—there are about ten in total—are neatly typed up. Anyone who has tried to decipher handwritten documents knows how exhaust-

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ing this process can be. A letter addressed to Miss Katharine Schroeder at Radcliffe College, dated May 8, 1942, catches my attention due to the notation of “Important,” handwritten twice across the letterhead in bold red crayon. Opening the letter with care, I find the following: My dear Miss Schroeder: I have just read of the very interesting program you are planning to present on Saturday, May 16th, and I am wondering if you would be willing to consider giving this entertainment for a group of patients at Lovell General Hospital. [. . .] We would appreciate hearing from you as to whether or not this is possible. If the group is not too large, I believe we could plan with the Cambridge Red Cross Motor Corps to bring the girls either some afternoon or evening which would be convenient for you. Our evening programs last usually from 7 to 8:30, as the patients must return to their wards before 9 o’clock. Thank you for considering this request. Very truly yours, Thirza B. McDonald Field Director at the American Red Cross Lovell General Hospital in Fort Devens

Below the letter, I read the following handwritten lines, signed by Katharine Schroeder, which seems to address students who are part of the dance group at Radcliffe College: I have felt very strongly that the dance group should, when it could possibly do so, contribute its small part to the exigencies arising from the present situation. To cheer the sick and wounded is important, and efforts should be made. The choice of date lies with us. I suggest that if the Dance Group feels this can be arranged, to do it as close as possible to our own fiesta would be ideal. Monday, May 18th, afternoon or evening, would be a very suitable time. Would

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those people who feel they can do this put their names down immediately, and as to what date and time they would prefer.37

I feel that today is my lucky day: this discovery in the Dance Correspondence 1939 folder (DPE RG XV Series 1, Carton 1, 27) links me to dance at Radcliffe College through the interests of one person, Katharine Schroeder, who was seemingly devoted to fostering dance at Radcliffe in relation to the community surrounding the College. I am grateful that my plans to find exciting new leads were fruitful so early in the process. However, at this point, I am not entirely sure I am heading in the right direction until I can confirm that Katharine is not a oneoff source that only circles back to itself; this would end this archival journey before it took off. Anxiously, I skim through the other letters in full anticipation of seeing another appearance of Miss Schroeder. My hunt is successful as I come across a thank-you note from Thirza B. McDonald, the Field Director at American Red Cross, who passionately writes on May 20, 1942: Dear Miss Schroeder: Since Sunday we have had many comments by the patients on the very colorful Mexican Fiesta which you presented here at the hospital. I don’t know when we have had anything as enthusiastically received. Will you extend our thanks to Miss Small and to the dancers for their visit. Our hospital news reporter has already written a review, and if our camera club develops any good pictures, we will send them on to you. Thank you again for coming. I hope we may have the pleasure of seeing you again, perhaps when Radcliffe opens in the fall. Very truly yours, Thirza B. McDonald

37 The words “efforts,” “date,” and “time” are also neatly underlined in the original document.

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Discovering this thank-you note seems to fill in another blank in this puzzle, introducing Miss Small. The wording “thanks to Miss Small and to the dancers” immediately leads me to the assumption that Miss Small was linked to the dance program as a faculty or staff member, although it is certainly possible that she was hired as a student worker at Radcliffe College. Upon further reading through the remaining correspondence, I find more letters addressed to “Miss Mary C. Small,” all of which deal with inquiries from male students about the dance offerings at Radcliffe College. For example, Neil Carson, who I assume is a student at Harvard College, asks on November 4, 1941: “Dear Miss Small: Could you give me some information about the introduction in Mexican dancing and classical ballet, mentioned on the bulletin board at the Phillips Brooks House?” Another inquiry is from George Taloiemie [spelling is hard to decipher], who asks on November 15 [year unknown]: “Dear Miss Small, could you please send me more information regarding the classes in Mexican and Ballet dancing? That is, who is eligible, how much time is required, experience, what is expected from the candidates?” Finally, a Mr. W.A. Schall simply inquires: “Dear Miss Small: Am very interested. Tell me more. When? Where? How often?” Attached to W.A. Schall’s inquiry is Miss Small’s answer: “Dear Mr. Schall, your unparalleled enthusiasm leaves us quite breathless. We doubt that we will be able in our humble way to satisfy your zest for knowledge, however you might work off an apparent excess of animal spirits by joining our class.” I sigh, joyously rather than tiredly, as reading Miss Small’s correspondence intrigues me to think not only about her role at Radcliffe College—which I assume was, at least partially, of administrative nature—but also about the fact that male Harvard students were inquiring about dance classes at Radcliffe. What is fascinating about these correspondence letters is that male students not only expressed an interest in ballet and Mexican dance, but also that these classes seem to be coeducational. In fact, Miss Small’s dance correspondence with male students allows me to connect the archival material with the literature on the history of Harvard-

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Radcliffe, which suggests that, “Harvard, compelled by wartime necessity to mix women into its classrooms in 1943” (Mandel 215), had approved joint instruction for extra-curricular classes before the full merger of academic classes could move forward. Radcliffe’s dance program, although firmly situated within a women’s college, seemed to be welcoming a mixed-sex environment in the dance studio. At the very least, Katharine Schroeder and Mary Small appear to approve of the idea of nurturing dance at Radcliffe as a place where coeducation could blossom. While I spend the next few days trying to locate information about male students taking dance classes at Radcliffe College in the 1940s, much to my dismay, my search on OASIS using keywords such as “men + ballet,” “men + dance,” or “male + ballet,” turn out negative at this point in time.38 I contemplate the reasons for the absence of more records that would shed light on male students interested in ballet. How visible were male students in dance classes? Were there too few of them to make their way into the official archival collection? Or perhaps those records, expect for a few correspondence letters and a handful of newspaper clippings, were not seen as important enough—for the documentation of the history of Radcliffe—to preserve. In general, the pool of literature on the history of Radcliffe suggests that during the 1940s, the college attempted to provide a space for women to nurture their separate identities (see chapter I for a brief summary of the history of Radcliffe College), despite the steady but slow development towards coeducation from the mid-1940s onward. Thus, the lack of rec-

38 Almost two years after my initial search for dancing men in the 1940s, I learn that there is more information available in an article published in the Harvard-Crimson student newspaper in 1939. The article, “Radcliffe Chorines Need Harvard Men for Dancing” states that Harvard “will need men to take part in a program of Russian dances which they plan for the spring.” It would be interesting to follow up this source to construct a more detailed picture of dancing men at Harvard during this time period (see post-scriptum).

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ords indicating the integration of male students into ballet classes could be an indicator that Radcliffe College wanted to preserve their history as Harvard’s coordinate women’s college, which was established to serve women in a single-sex rather than a mixed-sex environment. At the same time, the absence of records could also open up a discussion on how Harvard viewed dance as a typically female pastime that was not suitable for male students. In particular, it would be interesting to reflect on the place of men in dance at Harvard during that time period, especially during the wartime, which would open a new research trajectory. For a short moment, I lounge leisurely into my chair in the reading room, which prompts the woman next to my desk—who I haven’t noticed all morning—to suggest that, “It is o.k. to take a break periodically.” As the reading room has a zero tolerance policy for casual conversations, I just give her a responsive nod, but I appreciate the friendly and supportive environment. However, rather than taking a break, I feel the urge to continue my hunt. By the end of the morning, I finish reading through the materials in the Dance Correspondence 1939 file— which, interestingly, only contained correspondence from 1942 and not 1939—as well as finish photographing the materials with my iPhone, and archiving them on my iPad. The latter task turns out to be the most time consuming, as I do not only attempt to name and number each source, but also try to keep each in the original order found in the file according to the archival practice of the Dutch trio of Samuel Muller, Johan Feith, and Robert Fruin published in their Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives (see chapter II for a more thorough history of archival practices). Before I go to lunch, I share my new “archival acquaintances,” Miss Schroeder and Miss Small, with Sandy the librarian, whose enthusiasm about my findings always seems as great as my own. I am so fortunate to have her around, as her nature is exceedingly pleasant and helpful, and she is always eager to support my research. Although she has never heard of either Miss Schroeder or Miss Small, she gives me a friendly nod while pointing towards a large filing cabinet that is locat-

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ed at the other end of the room. “This is the archival storage for biographical files. Maybe we are lucky,” she says, while she enthusiastically pulls out the third drawer, “Biographical Files S – Z.” “These files have not been digitized yet, although we hope that this will happen soon,” she explains while she skillfully flicks through the folder. “Did you say her name was Schroeder, S – C – H – R – O – D – E - R?,” she asks? I am quick to respond, “Actually, it’s Schroeder with O – E,” but before I can finish my sentence, Sandy pulls out a small yellow folder. And here it is, a “Katharine Schroeder” folder, and, in that moment, I sense something important coming into focus. The fact that the file is archived in an old-fashioned physical object—a metallic cabinet with drawers that make a squeaking noise each time they are pulled open—is invigorating as it gives a “sound and feel” to history, making it tactile and within immediate reach. Although I consider myself to be a tech-savvy researcher who deeply appreciates the convenience of online archives, I find those moments very exciting in which, as a researcher, I have a chance to physically comb through materials that are simply catalogued in a drawer; they bring research alive and the archival scholar closer to the historical figure being studied. I remind myself that inquiring with the library staff about additional materials, sources, or suggestions is indispensible and utterly helpful for my research. Sandy’s search skills, both on- and offline, and her knowledge of archival holdings at the RCA are immeasurable. Sandy begins to laugh joyously as she hands over Katharine Schroeder’s folder to me. Although I am still speechless, she replies, “You are very welcome. Why don’t you sit down and have a look at what’s in the file while I look for Miss Small.” Before I settle into my chair, Sandy apologetically shrugs her shoulders informing me that there is no folder on Miss Small. “The biographical files are a quite small collection,” she explains, “I’m really sorry.” In this moment, instead of getting upset, I remind myself that archival research often hits dead ends. However, it is the raw passion to work with whatever source material is available that drives archival research forward as I

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begin to make meaning out of what is at my disposal. I give Sandy another smile, before I mentally put Miss Small aside, in order to give my full attention to Miss Schroeder.

K ATHARINE , T EACHER OF D ANCING AT R ADCLIFFE C OLLEGE When I open the biographical file, I have the great pleasure of discovering a sheet entitled “Information for the Publicity Office” dated October 4, 1940, which reveals that Katharine Schroeder held a position as “Teacher of Dancing.” Just thirty minutes ago, while I was anxious to make sense of the disparate bits and pieces of the Dance Correspondence 1939 folder, I had wondered about the role of Katharine at Radcliffe College. I am struck by the information sheet, as my initial question of “Who is Katharine Schroeder?” appears to be suddenly presented on a silver platter in front of my eyes. Indeed, I learn Katharine’s residential address was in Cambridge, 13 Ash Street, which is only a two-minute walk away from Radcliffe College. Her residence telephone is listed as “Trowbridge 1870,” which was most likely a shared party line telephone service that was common until around the 1940s. I am curious about Katharine’s home residence and I decide to use the World Wide Web as a research tool to enhance my traditional method of research with a virtual search. In fact, a quick search for “13 Ash Street” on Google leads me to a real estate company named “Zillow,” which advertises Katharine’s former residence in the following manner: “4701 square foot single family home has 5 bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms, built in 1873.” I am excited at discovering her home could potentially lead to a whole new avenue of research, one that illuminates the private life of a dance teacher in the 1940s. The next day, on my way to the Radcliffe Yard I pass the house, and as it is rather large, I begin to wonder if Katharine had a family in Cambridge—was she married, maybe with children—or, perhaps, she was renting a room with a Cambridge family. The three-

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story home fits well into the Victorian-era housing style that is situated in one of Cambridge’s most historic districts. Given the proximity to Radcliffe College and Harvard University, it is understandable why Katharine had chosen to live on this highly desirable street that allowed her to reach her workplace within minutes. I remind myself not to be too sidetracked from the original purpose of my research, which is to develop historical insights gleaned only from the process of archival research, but I value the information presented outside the physical archive. When I return to the archived information sheet, I read that Katharine was born in Sale, England, a small town within the Metropolitan Borough of Trafford in the Greater Manchester area.39 Although no birth date is given, I assume that Katharine was born somewhere between the early 1900s and the late 1910s, putting her into the mid-20s to late-30s age bracket during the 1940s. Katharine attended the Leeds Girls High School (LGHS) located in Headingley, England. The website for the school reveals it is advertised as a private, selective school for girls, which merged with the Leeds Grammar School in 1995. It is exciting to learn that LGHS’s motto is “Age Quod Agis,” which translates to “Do what you are doing.” It is fun to imagine that this motto might have inspired Katherine to continue and then follow her passion for dance. The archived information sheet that I discovered in her biographical file further reveals that she received her dance training at the Ginner-Mawer School of Dance and Drama, where she was able to study under well-known ballet teachers such as “Margaret Craske, Lydia Sokolova, Anton Dolin, Algeranov of the Russian Ballet, and Derra de Moroda.” While the RCA does not hold information on the Ginner-Mawer School of Dance and Drama, the teachers listed on Katharine’s information sheet give me insights into the sort of training that she might have received.

39 The census data indicates that Sale had a population between 10,000 and 15,000 in the period between the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century.

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What is interesting for my archive story is that I notice the things I value and how those values shape my interpretations of source material, leading me to examine my own background and preoccupations in relation to the archive. Indeed, my own knowledge of ballet—which I practiced for almost 25 years—and the specific style of ballet training these teachers would have taught lead me to believe that Katherine’s training was focused heavily on ballet and on folk dancing. As I am trained in both the Cecchetti ballet method as well as the classical ballet syllabus of the Royal Academy of Dance, I am well aware that the stylized representation of traditional European folk dances, such as character dances based on Hungarian, Italian, Polish, and Russian folk dances, represent an integral part of traditional ballet training in Europe. For example, the Italian Tarantella represents a well-known folk dance that had a direct influence on Italian ballet technique. Based on the information I gather in this early stage of my archival journey, I assume that Katharine’s ballet education was Cecchetti-based, especially as this teaching method was vital in the development of classical ballet in the United Kingdom during the early twentieth century. Further, from a historical perspective, classical ballet is innately related to folk dance, especially in Italian ballet technique, which tends to be more grounded through its focus on speedy intricate footwork. Learning folk dance movements were and still are part of Cecchetti training today. Thus Katharine’s folk dance training further strengthens my assumption into the training, which was presumably Cecchetti-based, that she might have received. My sense that Katharine was trained in the Cecchetti method leads me to inquire further into the lives of her teachers. Among Katharine’s ballet teachers was Sir Anton Dolin, principal with Serge Diaghilev’s Ballet Russes in the 1920, who later danced with the British ballerina Alicia Markova at the London Festival Ballet. In the late 1930s, Dolin’s career turned to dance history, including the publication of his autobiography Ballet Go Round from 1938 and Alicia Markova: Her Life and Art from 1953. Reading further in the information sheet, I also find that Lydia Sokolova and Algernoff, whose name was Russianized

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when he joined Anna Pavlova’s company in 1921, are listed as Katharine’s ballet teachers as well as British dancer Margaret Craske, who was a former member of the Serge Diaghilev Ballets Russes in the 1920s. However, Craske’s career was cut short due to a foot injury, which forced her to look into an alternative career as Enrico Cecchetti’s assistant. As one of the last disciples of Cecchetti, she later coauthored, with Cyril W. Beaumont, The Theory and Practice of Allegro in Classical Ballet published in 1930. I can vividly imagine to what extent Miss Craske’s strong Cecchetti method of teaching, in particular her well-known passion for exact technique and attention to detail, had influenced Katharine’s dance training. In 1956, Craske wrote a second publication entitled The Theory and Practice of Advanced Allegro in Classical Ballet with Friderica Derra de Moroda, another teacher listed as one of Katharine’s ballet instructors.40 I am excited to learn that Katharine studied under Derra de Moroda, in particular, since the Derra de Moroda Dance Archives (DdMDA) in Salzburg, Austria, represents one of the few large dance archives in Europe. In Sybille Dahm’s article “Archives of the Dance: The Derra de Moroda Dance Archives at the University of Salzburg,” I discover that it was “in England that her [de Moroda’s] deep interest in dance research originated” (142). Dahm’s research also discusses how Derra de Moroda developed a strong passion for dance history, in particular a curiosity about Baroque dance as well as an avid interest in the teaching of folk dance. Indeed, on the archived information sheet, Katharine listed de Moroda as a “Specialist in Hungarian Dancing,” information which I confirm in Dahm’s article where she continues to discuss how: As a dancer and as a collector, Friderica Derra de Moroda was most interested in all aspects of folk dance; her favourite subjects being the dances of her

40 “The Cecchetti Project,” a joint collaboration between the University of Surrey-Roehampton and the Language of Dance Centre in England examined Craske’s publications in great detail.

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Greek and Hungarian ancestors. For some years she directed the Greek branch of the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing; and she wrote a book on the Hungarian Csardas and Sor Dance, which was published by the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dancing in 1929. (78)

Katharine’s interest in studying folk dance techniques is also portrayed by Khan Bashiroff and Juan De Hernandez, both of whom are listed as “Specialists in Spanish Dancing” on the information sheet in which details of Katharine’s dance education background are revealed. Although I spend the rest of the afternoon trying to find more information about these two instructors—using not only OASIS to comb through Harvard Theatre Collection, but also browsing through the online catalogues of the Derra de Moroda Dance Archive in Salzburg, Austria and the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts in New York—I eventually have to give up as I hit a dead end.41 The next morning, I continue with the last sections on the information sheet, to include: “Positions Held; Honorary Appointments; Organizations Member of, and Publications.” These listings give me insights into Katharine’s professional experience before she became a teacher of dancing at Radcliffe College. Under positions held, the information sheet reveals that Katharine had “private connections, amateur and professional, in London, England, and Santa Barbara, California.” According to the information sheet, Katharine worked as a Teacher of Dancing at the Royal Naval School in Surrey, a town on the county boarder of Greater London, which was among the first girls’ boarding schools in England. Searching through the World Wide Web, I come across the website of the Royal School. There, I learn that the school, established in 1840, was “devoted to the cause of women’s ed-

41 I also contacted several dance historians, but none of them had ever heard of either Khan Bashiroff or Juan de Hernandez. While I do not further pursue this issue, I realize that it is certainly possible to continue this line of research in the hope of finding more information on these historical figures in another archive or publication.

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ucation and enabling women to be independent” (http://www.royalschool.org). These feminist concepts of women’s independence were revolutionary at that time, as they pre-date the movement for girl’s education in the late nineteenth century, information that I locate on the Royal School’s website.42 Today, the Royal School still offers ballet, jazz, and modern dance as part of its activity programs. I decide to contact the school via email to inquire about archival material, but unfortunately my attempt remains fruitless as the school’s archival material is not only limited, but also not available in a digital format as a response letter from Sarah Motley, Personal Assistant to the Headmistress at the Royal Naval School, confirms.43 Similarly, my inquiry into the Dulwich High School, the second of the two schools listed under “Positions held” on the information sheet, leads to nothing further. However, under “Honorary Appointments or Positions,” I discover that Katharine was an adjudicator in dancing for musical festivals in England, though no specific events are listed. Nev-

42 In 1995, the Royal School was founded as a result of a merger between the Royal Naval School and The Grove School, which were both girls’ schools (http://www.royal-school.org). Please note that the Royal School should not be confused with the Royal Ballet School. 43 A few months later, I received an invitation to visit the school archives from Sarah Motley, Personal Assistant to the Headmistress, who informs me that the Headmistress “Lynne Taylor-Gooby, asked me to drop you a line on her behalf. She has always been fascinated by history in general including that of The Royal Naval School. [. . .] We do have archives here but unfortunately no one who is employed to oversee and organise all the documents. One day on retirement from her current post Lynne would love to dedicate more time to the school archives. In the meantime when time allows she would be very happy to try to go through the archives manually to see if the name Katherine Schroeder appears. Lynne also wondered whether you ever came over to the UK as if so you would always be welcome to come to visit the School to have a look at the archives and she would enjoy meeting you too.”

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ertheless, a spidery script—written with a pencil—catches my attention and I decipher that Katharine “danced before Queen Mary + late King George in Covent Garden.” Despite my attempts to gain more information about this event, my research process becomes stuck; however, my inquiry has opened an exciting area for future historians who might pursue this archival path. This dilemma, however, is in itself worthy of noticing, as the process of interrogating archival sources can be as important as finding more evidence. Not all archival leads unfold into a full story; rather, they represent a useful part of larger detective work which further allows the researcher to contextualize the historical event or figure. Thus, I try to focus on acknowledging these dead ends as they help me to imagine how Katharine’s journey might lead me to pursue research in England at a later stage or for a different project. I realize that digging into Katharine’s dance education, particularly if I want to pursue this lead, requires a more in-depth search in the archives of the Royal Naval School and potentially other archives located in England. While snippets of her dance education can be found in the RCA, the place and shape of Katharine’s dance training are more likely to be found in overseas archives. It is the World Wide Web that helps me to discover leads, but the complexity of Katharine’s dance education reveals the limitations of not being on location with the source of the historical material. At the same time, it is important to understand that I consider my archival process in the RCA as the root to uncover a research project that I might pursue at a later point rather than an attempt to “finish” the story of a historical figure.44 However, these leads open up interesting

44 While at this point in time, it is not possible for me to follow the invitation by the Royal Naval School to consult their archives, I am delighted that this offer has the potential to open up a new research trajectory at some point in the future. In fact, it is fascinating to learn that I might find further information on Katharine in a different archive, which would allow me to dig deeper in her professional career as a dance teacher in England.

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research questions. Indeed, I am very interested in why Katherine’s entry point into the United States would be Santa Barbara, California in the late 1930s. Were her travels related to World War II events or were they driven by professional dance opportunities? While the archival material does not give me any indication, I am still fascinated by the potential research opportunities that might emerge from the questions raised in the archival research process. However, as my research is restricted to the RCA, I refocus my attention to the material in front of me, materials which lead me in yet another direction, the United States Midwest. Surprisingly, I find from the information sheet that Katharine was invited to Detroit, Michigan, in her role as a “Fellow of the Imperial Society of Dancing.” This title is a fascinating detail, since I now realize that Katharine was an accredited teacher in the Cecchetti method of classical ballet. As this point in my archival journey, the World Wide Web has the potential to provide me with information helping to shed light on Katharine’s accredited teacher status. Indeed, when I browse through the website of the Cecchetti International Classical Ballet (http://www.cicb.org/), an organization that has been established to act as a link between Cecchetti societies and teachers working with the Cecchetti method around the globe, I come across an intriguing detail. Putting the keywords “Katharine Schroeder” in the search box, the website guides me to the “Pioneers” rubric, where I find the biography of Sylvia J. Hamer (1900-93), who has been honored as a “Cecchetti Pioneer” for her teaching abilities. What is fascinating is the fact that she refers to Katharine as one of her teachers in Detroit preparing her for the Cecchetti teacher’s exam. It was Mr. Beaumont who sent Miss Katharine Schroeder (Kate Forbes) from Radcliff [sic] College to further instruct the teachers in the Cecchetti Method. After many hours, weeks, and years of work with Kate Forbes, Mr. Smith, Gertrude Jory, Sylvia Hamer, and Marjorie Hassard were ready for a teacher’s exam. The ISTD sent Ms. Margaret Craske to Detroit to examine the Detroit area teachers. (http://www.cicb.org/)

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I find the World Wide Web to be a valuable tool for exploring the complex network of Katharine’s dance training as well as her personal life. It is intriguing to think that perhaps Katharine’s maiden name was Forbes and she went to Santa Barbara to get married to a Schroeder. While I do not further pursue this lead, my reflection has opened another possible path for a future historian. Indeed, the Web opens up myriad trajectories into the bits and pieces of information, pieces that I, as archivist, put together to imagine and create a picture—although still blurry—of the time period before, or even while, she was employed at Radcliffe. Given the information found on the Cecchetti website, it is certainly enticing to reflect on the possibility that the Cecchetti Organization hired teachers from England to instruct in the United States. For example, the bits of information on Margaret Craske, one of Katharine’s teachers in England, that I find on the website allows me to fill in even more blanks. If Craske was sent from England to Michigan to teach for Cecchetti, it is possible that Katharine’s career took a similar turn. While at this point in my archival process, I can only make educated guesses about how to use and piece together the particular material that is at my disposal; it does become clear, however, that more in-depth research on the Cecchetti teachers could propel my research into new directions. Although the source material gives me only a few geographical reference points for Katharine’s professional journey from England to California, to Michigan, and eventually Massachusetts, at the very least, the information at hand provides me with several starting points for research projects that I might pursue in the future. At the end of a long day, I am glad that the information sheet set me on a trail of archival material I would not have expected to find, specifically concerning Katharine’s dance education in England. This trail of discovery also opens up questions about and insights into what might have been valued by Radcliffe College in terms of dance education in higher education. However, while I could verify the existence of various schools and teachers under which Katharine had studied, I also need to acknowledge the limitations of my search on the World Wide

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Web. I have to admit that it is refreshing—in a tech-savvy, modern way—to use the Internet as an archive tool to support my on-site archival journey at the RCA, although I second Renée M. Sentilles’s wise observations: The Internet acts much like the car, in that the World Wide Web is a complex network of highways and the computer acts as our vehicle for speeding from point to point at the rate of whatever access we have purchased. [. . .] Theoretically, it is too easy to find the information to expect otherwise. But let us also be honest: the computer often does not live up to the ideal, and because we are creating expectations that leave no room for technological breakdown, this can cause real problems. (154)

The World Wide Web leads my research beyond the walls of the RCA, and, admittedly, the materials found on the Internet were interesting as they did send me on an imaginative journey. However, “virtual archives will never serve as more than a place to begin and end the research journey; never a place to dwell” (Sentilles 155). Given my experience with both physical and virtual archival research, I believe it is vital for my archival experience to physically browse with my hands and eyes through primary sources, those tangible artifacts, which I can only find at a physical archive, such as the RCA. On the other hand, virtually exploring Katharine’s dance training in England—which would not have been possible without access to the World Wide Web—allows me to contextualize her as a historical figure within a manageable timeframe and without financial constraints. Indeed, it is important to realize that the financial constraints often inhibiting access to an archive are related to substantial costs for accommodation and transport, especially as the nature of narrating archive stories also requires a sustained period of time in a site, or at the very least multiple visits. Again, I realize the limitations of archival research, but also acknowledge how these preparatory discoveries help blaze the trail for future archival and historical researchers so that time and money spent can be focused and well organized. It is fascinating

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that more than seventy years later the information sheet and the biographical information both produce certain histories that lead a contemporary historian to imagine what the dance culture of Radcliffe was like in the 1940s. I am now curious to retrieve further historical trajectories of Katharine Schroeder’s position as a teacher of dancing at Radcliffe and to see what possible connections might exist between her experience and my own seventy years later.

K ATHARINE ’ S D ANCE O FFERINGS AT R ADCLIFFE C OLLEGE After my morning work exploring the archives of Katharine Schroeder and as I head to an intermediate level ballet class offered as a cocurricular activity through the Harvard Dance Center, I contemplate to what extent my archival research is also a very personal activity. I learn that not only being at the location where my historical subjects lived, but also attempting to engage in similar extracurricular dance activities is invaluable for narrating my archive stories. Therefore, I am excited not only about the archival sources, but also by what I might find along my archival journey when participating in parallel, extracurricular dance activities offered at Harvard University. Further, my participation becomes even more embedded in the historical process when I realize through photos obtained of the 1910 Radcliffe campus that the majority of the buildings and classrooms surrounding my activities retain the same structure as they did for my archival participants. This approach allows me to gain a “lived experience” of the history of dance at Radcliffe College and Harvard University. While walking through the present day campus and imagining how these same buildings would feel to Katharine as she approached her teaching duties, I also notice the diversity of students and think about how the population and interests of the campus have probably changed over time. On my way to the Office for the Arts (OFA) in 74 Mount Auburn Street, where one of the Harvard dance studios is located, I al-

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so reflect on how my own focus on ballet—an activity which I pursued for the past 25 years—ultimately determines what leads I pursue, what details I discover, and what assumptions I make about the history of dance at Radcliffe College and Harvard University. While today ballet classes are offered on a daily basis at Harvard, it is important to acknowledge the wide range of dance activities, from African dance to improvisation, that are also currently offered; in fact, ballet represents only a fraction of what is available to students today. However, ballet is the terrain in which I feel “at home” and the research path that admittedly inspires my direction. When I arrive at the OFA building, the heavy wooden door at the entrance is a literal reminder that I enter a historical building. I usually arrive at least twenty minutes before the class starts as I like to mentally prepare for the physical activity and today is no exception to this rule. While I wait in the foyer of the building, I admire the numerous photographs that are mounted to the wall, most of them featuring former Radcliffe or Harvard students who excelled in dance. The majority of the photographs have captions in which the name of students, the performance work, the choreographer, and the date of the photos are portrayed. I consider this activity as an extension of my work in the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA), an exploration of “the archive outside the archive,” helping me to make it easier for me to learn—in a rather casual way—more about Radcliffe College’s and Harvard University’s dance history. I skim through the captions to see if any of the names are familiar. In particular, I pay attention to black and white photographs in hope of coming across any material that dates pre1950s. To my dismay, the few photographs that seem to be taken during the first half of the century only have a general caption, for example “Gymnastic Exhibition, 1920s” or “Radcliffe Dance Group on the Lawn in front of Agassiz House, 1950s.”45 Some of the historical im-

45 This is not surprising, considering that the Office for the Arts was created in 1973 with the main goal to support student engagement in the arts

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ages even look familiar, and I remember that I have seen them in A Century to Celebrate Radcliffe College, 1879 – 1979, a survey featuring more than 240 illustrations and photographs from the Radcliffe College and Harvard University Archives. Even if the majority of the photographs are dated post-1950s—a period that is beyond the scope of my archival research—looking at them helps me to picture and put the dance activities and events at Radcliffe College and Harvard University into a broader context. The photos also confirm that the people shaping dance and the dance activities taking place in the early part of the twentieth century set the scene for the diversity and breadth of dance activities now possible for Harvard students to participate in. This sense of history as alive ultimately complements the narrating of my archive stories.46 When the class starts, all my attention goes to executing the steps as accurately as I can. I consider each ballet class as “real-life” experience that allows me to physically experience dance at Harvard University, an experience that eventually shapes the narratives that I find in the RCA as I dance in the footsteps of my historical figures. I adore the ballet teacher of this particular class, as she sets up intense movement phrases that let me fully immerse into dance. Towards the end of the class, my lower legs—in particular my shins—feel sore and I blame the long petit allegro section that we practiced at the end of the class for my soreness. I realize how exciting it is to have the opportunity to discover the context from which my current ballet experience at Harvard University springs. Even though my observations do not allow me to draw conclusions of how dance might have been during the first half of the twentieth century, I do gain a sense of lineage of how what I am experiencing now could have emerged from those ghosts living in my

through integrating the arts—both visual and performing arts—into university life and partner with local, national, and international constituencies. 46 The early photographs pre-1950s seem to focus on gymnastics, folk dance, and modern dance activities, while more recent photographs, post-1980s, show classical ballet (on pointe) as well as modern dance.

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archives.47 The photographs allow me to get a better sense of how Katharine’s dance seed at Radcliffe College, often portrayed as amateurish in the archive literature, grew into a full tree of myriad dance forms, forms that are currently practiced as deeply disciplined and on a professional level.

M ILESTONES

IN

K ATHARINE ’ S D ANCE C AREER

The next morning, after a quick check-in at the front of the SL, a process that became part of my daily routine, I head to the storage cabinet for biographical files. Today, the drawer opens smoothly rather than making that grinding, squeaking noise, which I experienced when I opened it for the first time. These little incidents enrich my archive stories, as they not only give me a better sense of working with source material in the physical archives, but also create memorable moments that allow me to narrate my experience in the RCA. In fact, the squeaking noise almost feels like an invitation to pick up Katharine’s biographical file yet again. I briefly glance at the information sheet from yesterday and before I turn the page, I come across a handful of newspaper cuttings most of which are from The Boston Globe. Each clip is glued in a rather crafty way on a single sheet and contains information on Katharine Schroeder’s dance offerings at Radcliffe College. At first glance, most of the newspaper clippings, about four or five, appear to be cut out from the “Today in Society” section of The Boston Globe. Indeed, it is fascinating to think that Katharine’s passion for dance, in particular her artistic

47 The limitations and scope of this chapter do not allow me to explore more deeply the current state of dance at Harvard University. However, the experience of taking class is too important for my archival journey to go unnoticed, as this was an essential element of “being on location,” which ultimately helped me to gain a better understanding of the role of dance at this institution.

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work and her dancer offerings at Radcliffe College, was worthy to be published in a daily newspaper. While the articles cover a variety of events in the Greater Boston area, Katharine’s name is underlined in most of the clippings making it easy to find the relevant selections. The first one reads: Post-debs Theodorn [sic?] Roosevelt, Joan Lothrop and Helena Edgell are planning a busy schedule. They plan to study the ballet this Fall and Winter at the classes which Mrs. Warren Lothrop is sponsoring at her Harvard house, Katharine Schroeder as instructor. (“Today in Society” in The Boston Globe, September 6, 1941, n.p.)

I am elated that this article provides me a glimpse into Katherine’s teaching career, which seems to include ballet teaching. Given her extensive background in ballet, and in particular her status as a fellow of the Imperial Society of Dancing, it does not come as a surprise that I find evidence of Katharine’s ballet teaching activities. When I return to Katharine’s biographical file later this same day, I find more newspaper clippings announcing bits and pieces of her repertoire of teaching dance. I experience these newspaper clippings as very provocative for my research, as they draw me into the mindset of a reader during the 1940s. For example, one article in The Boston Globe reads: With the arrival of September, vacationists are returning, many of them to enroll in Fall classes. The blue ribbon for the most unusual class this month goes to one organized by Miss Katharine Schroeder, who gives classical ballet and Mexican dancing at Mrs. Warren Lothrop’s house in Harvard for a fortnight. Guest teacher this year is Algeranoff of the Col de Basil Ballet Russe Company. Miss Schroeder, who is an instructor at Radcliffe College, has just returned from a summer in Mexico, where she studied the native dances. Her classes are now in their final week. Mr. Algeranoff who is teaching portions of “Prince Igor,” plans to go to Toronto on Monday to continue performances. (“Today in Society” in The Boston Globe, September 10, 1941, n.p.)

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As I read these lines, I feel instantly drawn into the world of the past in which students read the announcement of exciting—and probably rather innovative—extracurricular activities as the “blue ribbon for the most unusual class” suggests. Further, as I examine the article, I get excited when I find halfway down the page information on Katharine’s study trip to Mexico. Given Katharine’s interest in Spanish folklore dancing—information I remember from her dance training listed on the information sheet—her trip to Mexico does not surprise me, but rather confirms what I discovered in earlier sources. While I do not find any more information on Katharine’s summer in Mexico—for example, where and what dances she had studied, and who were her teachers—I feel that the little information that I have is enough to fill in some blanks on Katharine’s resume, giving me at least partial answers to my questions about her own dance training as well as classes that she offered. I sense that she took seriously her education in the dances of other cultures and that she, too, was a researcher, someone who felt the need to learn closely from the primary source. At that moment, my archival journey into the primary sources depicting Katherine’s life intersected with her journey to find the primary sources of dance in Mexico. As I continue to go through Katharine’s biographical file, I pay attention to not only the origin of the source, but also its date in order to get a better sense of the chronology of events. Yet, archival records are not always complete, nor clearly in chronological order. I find it rather frustrating when I stumble across archival material where pieces of information—such as dates or other publication details—are missing. Nevertheless, these incomplete sources are still valid, and often have the potential to foster curiosity about how historical and archival scholarship might point out areas of needed clarifying research. I remind myself that what gets preserved in an archive has already been deemed significant by an archivist at some point in the past. As a researcher, I learn that unsystematically archived sources and miscellaneous pieces of information might also lead to an understanding of the larger picture and the context of the historical figure, even if a somewhat confused picture.

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An example of this is the next newspaper clipping, which, even if missing date and page number, sheds lights on further dance classes offered by Katharine: A course in folk dancing will be given in the Lee Auditorium at the Y.W.C.A., 140 Clarendon Street, from Oct. 14 to Dec. 9, on Monday evenings from 6 to 7. Louise Chapin, branch teacher of the English Folk Dance Society of America, will conduct American Country dances; Kathrine [sic] Schroeder, director of dance at Radcliffe College, Russian and Slavic dances; (The Boston Globe, n.d, n.p.)48

Although I do not have any previous information indicating Katharine’s dance training in Russian and Slavic dances, I assume that she studied folk dances during her ballet training in England under Margaret Craske and Friderica Derra de Moroda. In fact, character dances in ballet are usually based on steps and style of national folk dances of Hungary (Csárdás), Russia (Mazurka), Poland (Tarantella), and Spain (Flamenco), but with ballet elements included.49 The interesting issue here is how the connection between ballet and folk dance set the scene for a future dance curriculum at Radcliffe, a curriculum that might have sown the seeds for their current offerings in world dance forms.50

48 With the purpose of this research on archival story-ing, in which I explore and narrate dance histories that I found at the Radcliffe College Archives, I attempt to cite the sources as I found them in this particular archive. Thus, I only put information from the archives available, rather than trying to do a “full history,” which would require to dig more deeply into the source material in order to find the exact date and location. 49 Even today folk dances are still widely taught in ballet training, either as an integral part of classical ballet training or as a separate skill within the graded examination syllabus of the Royal Academy of Dance. 50 For example, during the period of my Visiting Fellowship (2010 – 2012), the dance class offerings at the Harvard Dance Center included African

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Even though this article in The Boston Globe appears to be the only source, at least in the Radcliffe College Archives, which portrays Katherine as a teacher of Russian and Slavic dances, I am curious to see if I will come across further evidence of her experience with these stylistic dances at a later stage during my archival journey.51 As my goal is to explore the process of my archival experience at the RCA, I am less concerned with the dead ends that I find along my archival journey; rather, I try to treat each source as pieces of possible evolving stories in which disparate details eventually come together to create insights into how future stories might be pursued. More importantly, my archival research sets the stage for where and how I or other historians might continue historical pursuits outside of the walls of the RCA, such as newspaper archives or specific dance archives that would complement the initial findings within my current archival stories. The last newspaper clipping that I find in the biographical folder catches my attention as it is from The Detroit Free Press rather than The Boston Globe, indicating yet another milestone of Katharine’s dance career. The article states that: Miss Katherine [sic] Schroeder, of Radcliffe College, Boston, will conduct a course on Cecchetti examinations, Jan. 2, 3, and 4, at the Theodore J. Smith Studios, under the sponsorship of the Cecchetti Society of the Dancing Masters of Michigan. The course will be for members and their assistants only. In the afternoons there will be a course for students of members who have passed their second examination. (“Around Town with the Free Press” in The Detroit Free Press, Michigan, December 28, 1941, n.p.)

dance and many student-run dance organizations focused on world dance forms such as South Asian, Philippine, or Korean dance, to name only a few. 51 Jody Weber’s publication, The Evolution of Aesthetic and Expressive Dance in Boston, mentions Katharine as a dance instructor at Radcliffe College.

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This revelation helps me to confirm Katharine’s activities as a “Fellow of the Imperial Society of Dancing,” information which I had sourced just a few days ago. In fact, the newspaper clipping represents a fascinating archival source that helps me piece various geographical locations of Katharine’s professional career together. Mapping the locations of her dance career from her dance training in England, to her study trip to Mexico, to her further teaching activities in the US Midwest, and East and West coasts, allows me to unravel Katharine’s professional journey and her influence on those who interacted with her along that path. It is thrilling to see that Katharine traveled extensively, and, although I only get a glimpse of her professional dance activities, her travels give me a strong sense of the complexity of Katharine’s career and her potential influence on the discipline of dance as an academic pursuit for future generations in the Radcliffe College and Harvard University dance communities.

K ATHARINE ’ S T EACHING P HILOSOPHY The next day, before I move on with my search, I cannot help but notice the different spellings for Miss Schroeder’s first name: Katharine, Kathrine, Kate, and Katherine. When I first become aware of the different spellings, I go back to OASIS for another search using the alternative spellings I came across in the biographical file. While the search turns out negative, I contemplate the complexity of archival research and the methods I use as the spelling of keywords can shape what I might or might not find. Indeed, the cyclical process that is required for archival work, in which I go back and forth to verify source material, is rather time-consuming. However, this cyclical process also allows me the chance to revisit archival material and recontextualize the information with each new cycle. This constant re-shaping allows the future historian a chance to see the complexity of the materials and their possible interconnectivities. Further, from a methodological perspective, this recycling process is helpful in narrating a continuous archive story,

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a narrative that continues to build and find rich details with each new insight gleaned from the materials. The next couple of days, I work through the “Dance Clippings, 1937 – 40 RG XVf. 30” folder, where I become increasingly aware that there is a considerable number of newspaper clippings—around ten to fifteen articles—which mention Katharine Schroeder’s various dance activities at Radcliffe College. To my surprise, however, her name is not listed as a keyword for this particular folder in OASIS. I wonder how this missing keyword status reflects other research I discovered about the invisibility of women at Harvard. Further, it is interesting that even though she may not have made it to the level of major indexing, Katharine’s name is printed on many newspapers and reports. This visibility is in contrast to most of the published literature which suggests that women faculty at Harvard University were almost invisible during the first half of the nineteenth century. For example, Jane Knowles’s book chapter, “Harvard’s Invisible Faculty” in Yards and Gates, features four short portraits of Harvard women faculty, who despite their teaching and research posts “were marginal figures, [who] did not appear in catalogs, and have received little recognition in the histories of Harvard” (188). In the same publication, Phyllis Keller’s chapter, “Women with High Influence, Low Visibility,” which is written in a first-person style, reports that although they “were educated (if inexperienced), eager to be part of the university, and bargain-priced” (192), women were merely considered for entry-level secretarial jobs and only a few reached a relatively high level in Harvard’s administration. Yet, the newspaper clippings in this particular folder suggest that Katharine was rather visible at Harvard-Radcliffe, and this visibility leads me into new paths, which might make sense of her presence in the RCA. A possible explanation is that Radcliffe College’s long history “as a pioneer not only in liberating women's intellect, but also in liberating the female body through the art of movement” (“Dance at Radcliffe” 1) represents a core institutional value that was simply archive-worthy. It is also fair to assume that Katharine was a popular instructor, whose

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students not only appreciated her dance activities at Radcliffe, but also were drawn to her by certain personality traits. Further, Katharine’s background in Europe and in classical ballet also made interesting print, especially in the society newspaper pages. In a newspaper clipping entitled “New Dance Instructor Interested in Interpretation of Symphonies” (Nov 26 1937, n.p.), Katharine declares, when asked what students will get out of their work with her, that, “she expected them to have really a good time at each lesson.” As it is the case at Harvard University today, Radcliffe College placed an emphasis on extracurricular activities, educating what Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz calls the “‘all-round girl,’ balancing academics with drama, athletics, and cultural clubs on a campus that mirrored her development” (quoted in Bruce 140). I make the assumption here that Katherine saw this creation of the “all-round girl” as something that could be enjoyed, and, therefore became a method for engaging her teaching. Further, it is reasonable to imagine that Katharine’s role as a teacher of dancing assumed responsibilities for the health of young women bodies through a fairly structured program of dance exercise that was in line with the physical education requirements at Radcliffe College. As Gloria Bruce points out, “gymnastics, dance, and Indian club exercises [. . .] performed the essential job of maintaining good health” (142-3), and thus the dance and physical education faculty were vital to “mold women students in accordance with acceptable social mores of femininity” (Paul 183). Katharine seems to have taken this role of dance very seriously when she states that dancing produces “a more graceful way of using the body [. . .]” and “a more poised young lady to take her place in the rather confusing social circus of the 1930’s” (quoted in “New Dance Instructor Interested in Interpretation of Symphonies” Nov 26 1937, n.p.). I can only speculate to what events Katharine referred to when she talked about the “rather confusing social circus” during this time period, but she seems to have a keen awareness of how the roles for women were changing and that the newly emerging modern woman would be one whose ability to control her body could serve her well in navigating the complex changes hap-

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pening in society. In fact, it is quite possible that Katharine may have been even referring to the emerging plan of a joint Harvard-Radcliffe instruction (see chapter I and chapter VI for a more detailed exploration of joint academic and extracurricular activities), which eventually took effect in 1943.52 Continuing my research in the hope of discovering more aspects of Katharine’s teaching and how she discusses her role at Radcliffe, I leaf eagerly through the “Dance Clippings, 1937 – 40 RG XVf. 30” folder, and eventually come across an article entitled, “Miss Schroeder To Give Tea For Dance Classes Today: Sections Will Dance For Each Other to Illustrate Development.” Although I am slightly disappointed that the article does not contain any photographs, the title is compelling enough to catch my attention. While I do not know where it has been published, the nature of the article suggests that it is a magazine or journal produced by Radcliffe itself. The article states: Miss Schroeder, who is teaching the modern dance at Radcliffe this year, will have a tea for all the students taking her course today, before the Dance Group Exhibition for the Conference of Radcliffe Representatives and any students who wish to go. The Dance Group, the two intermediate sections, and the three elementary classes will attend and will dance for one another to illustrate the development of the technique. This will be followed by the dancing of the advanced group which will illustrate the further development of what the others will have done. They will do studies in line and rhythm, and then each member of the group of eight will do an original dance. There will be different dances to

52 As the 1930s were dominated by the greatest economic crisis in American history—commonly referred to as the Great Depression—it is quite possible that Katharine’s teaching philosophy promoted that young women develop courage and determination to help the country through this dire economic crisis. In fact, the educated woman served as a symbol of publicspirited womanhood in a time of national crisis. While the scope of this research does not allow me to explore this aspect more thoroughly, this aspect can provide a starting point for another research avenue in the future.

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the same piece of music, a selection from Spalding’s suite, “Kechings.” The finale will be part of a Russian suite, which will be danced in costume. The choreography for this suite was arranged by Miss Schroeder.

This article brings out the fact that Katharine had her students perform original works stemming from what I assume is a mixture of ballet technique and folk dance classes. This insight adds another dimension for how Katharine set the scene for the development of dance as a creative art within the Radcliffe dance community. Further, the inclusion of the students’ original dance-making demonstrates that as a teacher, Katharine was having her students take active control of their learning and understanding of dance. While I do not pursue these possible research questions any further in my current work, I do realize that speculations about future research paths constitute a vital element of my archival story-ing methodology as they shape the evolving narratives I tell the reader. It is important to understand my archive stories do not intend to complete the narrative of these historical figures, but only bring aspects of their lives in possible connections with the historical contexts in which they lived. These possibilities are brought to life through the process I undertook as an archival researcher becoming acquainted with my stories’ characters over time. My hope is that these archival stories can make the voices of the historical figures heard within future historical conversations. With this thought in mind, I keep searching for more evidence that feeds my speculative thoughts, guiding me to uncovering more missing pieces as each provides clues for where I might explore next.

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T HE P LEASURE

OF

“S EEING ” K ATHARINE

The next few hours, during which I browse through the “Dance Clippings, 1937 – 40 RG XVf. 30” folder, my search culminates in a newspaper clipping which catches my attention, as it features a headshot of Katharine Schroeder, allowing me to “see” her for the first time. Although at this point in my archival process, I had met Katharine through numerous textual sources, I had not discovered a photograph of her, although I had tried countless times to locate a photograph of her. Although the exposure to air and light had turned the newspaper clipping yellow, finally “seeing” Katharine—despite the bad quality of the photograph—adds a visual dimension to my archive story. Indeed, the photograph provides a clear evidence of my historical figure. This pleasure of “seeing” her, however, takes me by surprise as I skim through an article entitled “Students Take Over Program at Radcliffe Conference,” published on March 26, 1938 in The Boston Globe. When I look closely, I notice that the text is framed by three pictures, the top one featuring Radcliffe students posing in Russian dance costumes, the two bottom picture portray headshots of Katharine Schroeder and Radcliffe student Norma Taylor. Looking at a photograph of Katharine, I notice that she appears quite youthful, probably in her early thirties, sporting shorter waved hair—most likely permanently waved—a clean and sleek style that defined women’s hair in the 1930s and was very different than the traditional ballet look of a tight bun pulled away from the face. Katharine’s fine bone structure and her large eyes express a sense of sophistication that reminds me of the Hollywood movie stars of the “Golden Age,” such as Greta Garbo or Joan Crawford. Discovering a visual source makes her instantly more alive and I am keen to find more evidence about who Katharine was as a young woman during that time period.

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Figure 3: Photograph of Katharine Schroeder in the Boston Globe. Courtesy of the Radcliffe College Archives, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University.

Seeing Katharine Schroeder’s picture (bottom left side) brings her suddenly more alive and helps me to build a deeper connection with the historical figure I have been reading about. I can see Katharine as a modern woman and a progressive teacher, who fostered a diverse dance offering at Radcliffe College, a dance curriculum that reflects the diversity of dance classes that are offered at Harvard University in the twenty-first century.

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Katharine’s photograph helps my imagination to piece together a story, in which she is more alive than ever before, as the visual source seems to have left a historical trace that shapes my archive story, a trace that allows me to visualize Katharine at Radcliffe College. While I had spent hours and days over Katharine’s biography in textual sources, it is through the photograph that I feel connected to her dance spirit and her passion for the performing arts. As an archival researcher, it feels extremely important to build connections with the historical figure from diverse vantage points as each new connection brings richer details to the complexity of that figure’s life. The sense of the historical figure’s individual life connecting with the researcher’s individual’s life, for example through a photograph, is what archivist Elizabeth Birmingham calls “research as lived experience” (139), or the place where the researcher connects human-to-human with the historical figure.

D ANCING B ETWEEN

THE

C LASHING B LADES

In mid-November, an early winter storm brings the fall foliage—which was in full peak during most of the time I spent researching Katharine—to an end, and I literally turn over another leaf as I sense I have exhausted the archival evidence that piqued my interests during my archival journey. This process of finding closure almost feels like the ending of a novel or a television series that you do not want to end; however, while I bring this archive story to an end, it is certainly not the end. Even though archival story-ing brings ideas to light rather than constructing a “complete” history, it is important to remember that I can still continue to question the material. In fact, piecing together the different ideas I gathered over the past two months is exciting as I see my archive stories constantly evolve depending on how my own questioning develops with each newly found lead. As I browse through the few remaining documents in the “Dance, Posters, and Programs” (RG XV. 25) folder, I realize that despite the gaps in the archival material,

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Katharine’s life is well-documented, and I feel blessed to get to know her as part of my archival journey. To conclude, my final search leads me to a newspaper clipping entitled “Mexican Fiesta at Radcliffe Promises to Be Colorful Event” in the Monitor dated May 9, 1942 (“Dance Clippings, 1937 – 40” RG XVf. 30) reporting that: Miss Katharine Schroeder, of Radcliffe College, who has been teaching basic Mexican dances to her American pupils in preparation for a Mexican Fiesta at the College next Saturday, May 16, has found an instinctive understanding between the two countries. [. . .] The students have been training for their spring performance since Thanksgiving, and have learned each dance in its authentic form. [. . .] Some of the costumes for the fiesta are originals which Miss Schroeder brought back with her from Mexico.

I am thrilled to find this information, as it allows me to tie the Mexican fiesta back to Katharine’s summer in Mexico in 1941, which I discovered at the beginning of my archival journey with Katharine. The newspaper clipping also reveals a captivating detail that allows me further imagine Katharine as a progressive teacher, who fostered a diverse dance curriculum at Radcliffe College: The most exciting dance on the program, performed by Miss Schroeder, James Nygren (Harvard) and the Mexican dancer, Aldo Cadena, will be “Los Machetes,” a knife dance with a girl dancing between the clashing blades.53

It is fascinating to read about a knife dance, as I imagine not only Katharine as a performer literally dancing between flying knives, but also figuratively as a Radcliffe College staff member caught in the crossfire of the traditionally male-orientated Harvard administration.

53 Although I do not further pursue research on James Nygren and Aldo Cadena, this information has the potential to create a new archive story that sheds further light on dance at Harvard-Radcliffe.

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Indeed, this image of Katharine dancing between the clashing blades evokes many questions that have the potential to fuel future archive stories that explore dance histories at Radcliffe College: Was it common for staff members to perform on stage alongside their students? Did the Harvard-Radcliffe administration approve of Katharine’s various performance activities on stage? To what extent did Katharine’s work receive artistic and academic respect among her colleagues? While I do not have answers to these questions, the sketch of my archival journey provides an opportunity not only to bring snippets of Katharine to light, demonstrating that her life as a teacher of dancing at Radcliffe College was complex and multifaceted, but also to highlight questions that allow future historians to investigate potential obstacles dance teachers faced during this time period.

VI. Archive Story III From Dancing Elephants and Men at Radcliffe

H OW N ATURE IS

AFFECTING

S CHOLARSHIP

Tradition says that Harvard University never closes its doors due to inclement weather; however, at the end of January, I learned that every rule has its exception. With gusting winds and heavy snowfall, the arrival of a blizzard brings the Harvard campus to a two-day standstill. On the front page of the Harvard Law Record, the independent newspaper at the Harvard Law School (HLS), Joey Seiler reports: Faculty who have been at the Law School for some time say this may be only the third closing for inclement weather in more than 30 years. According to Cosgrove, five years ago Cambridge saw over two feet of snow by Winter Quarter exams were still held as scheduled. Just last year, Cosgrove emailed students to let them know that ‘each year a few hopeful students inquire about snow day – the answer is that Harvard remains open in snow – always has – sorry about that.’ (1)

The intensity of the blizzard closes not only the HLS, but also every building on the Harvard University campus, including the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) at the Schlesinger Library (SL), and thus my archival research. Despite the inconvenience of Mother Nature’s force,

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I am excited over the opportunity to be part of “history in the making” (1), as Joey Seiler calls the snow day. In particular, I enjoy the view I have from my dormitory room located next to the HLS where the lawn proves to be a very amusing location as many Harvard students indulge in the unexpected freedom of the snow day: there are ongoing snowball fights while other students even start to build an igloo on the lawn of Hastings Hall dormitory. Indeed, the masses of snow lead to spectacular entertainments, which I observe with pleasure through the bay window of my warm and cozy dormitory room, although, I have no intention to mingle with other students in freezing temperatures. Due to the closure of the campus, I am literally locked into my residence hall. However, I decide to use this time effectively searching for new archival leads by browsing the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) holdings online through OASIS, Harvard University’s online search system. When I click on the start page of OASIS, I am grateful for how the expanded capabilities of online search engines allow me to continue my work, despite the snow day and without any interruption. At the same time, searching through OASIS from the comfort of my dormitory room feels strangely unfamiliar; it disrupts my traditional approach of conducting archival research in the actual physical archives, a process I had adopted since the start of my research more than six months ago. However, as I hear icy wind furiously blow against my window— leaving heaps of snow piling up on the window frame—I am relieved to be “locked up” inside my dormitory room. Yet, even if the location from where I access OASIS and the outside weather conditions should not affect the archival process, the snow day, in all its “winter wonderland-ness” does seem to shift my scholarship practice: I feel strangely disconnected from the physical archives. I miss the familiar routine of checking in at the front desk, the friendly encouragement of librarians, and the ability to ask questions whenever I get stuck in my search. While at first it seemed to be an exciting idea to work from the comfort of my dormitory room, after an hour of browsing, I give up. Breaking my usual routine of leafing through the online search system

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appears to affect my concentration; there are also too many distractions as I associate my dormitory room with my private life rather than my work environment. What I realize in this moment, therefore, is that the archival process is often embedded in routines and rituals through which the researcher develops a sense of a personal practice of how he or she chooses to search in the archive. Similar to how John Randolph describes his archival process in “The Bakunin Family Archive” when he “experienced a cultural trusteeship firsthand, partly through the ritual of taking tea with the archivists,” (225) my own archival search is primarily situated in the traditional reading room of the Schlesinger Library (SL) rather than accessing the archive virtually from my own home. Although the snow day remains fruitless in terms of advancing my search for historical material, I am grateful that this experience fosters an appreciation of the importance of “being on location” as part of my archival journey. “Being on location” gains a new meaning, as I associate it with the intimacy of the archive’s physical space. The RCA provides me with an archival experience in which I can witness the source material and engage in an intellectual tradition of being physically—rather than virtually—located in an archive. As an archival researcher, I developed routines, which created a certain rhythm of working in a known environment. The snow day teaches me that my own rhythm in exploring archive stories works with the actual physical materials in hand. Thus, at this stage in my archival research, getting my hands “dirty” in the physical archives where I can breathe, feel, and see the archival journey unfold in front of my eyes, represents the best way for my own archival process given how I have created it to this point. At the same time, I realize that if I were forced to work from a distance, my rhythm would develop differently and my source material collection process would perhaps unearth differing types of stories. Instead of further trawling through OASIS, I decide to put on my winter boots and take a walk to the RCA in order to bring my usual routines back into my bodily actions. While I am aware that it will be a burdensome adventure to walk through the masses of snow to the ar-

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chive—which will certainly be closed—I have the desire to see the archive in this new snowy environment. As soon as I open the door to leave the residence hall, icy wind blows into my face. I begin to wonder how Radcliffe students experienced the frosty New England Winters, but my thoughts are interrupted as I am literally stuck in the snow just after a few steps. I break out in laughter, as the metaphor of “being stuck” on OASIS earlier this morning suddenly becomes reality. For a brief moment, I recall Anne Chisholm’s description of everyday life at Radcliffe College in “Feminism and Femininity in Almost Equal Balance,” when she states that “a long walk [from the dormitories] to Harvard [is] time-consuming and unpleasant during most of the Cambridge winter” (quoted in Andrew K. Mandel 216). As I learn how difficult it is to walk in the deep snow, I can certainly relate to Chisholm’s observation of the unpredictable and cold New England weather during the winter months. However, I am determined to make it to the archive! After all, I consider experiencing the blizzard as part of my archival journey, one of “being on location” as well as an experience that many Radcliffe students must have had in the past, “as neither rain, nor show, nor dark of night could keep these hardy souls from their appointed rounds” (Karnovsky 236). As I walk briskly through the snow, it is exciting to think of following this “can-do” Radcliffe spirit.54 Despite the fact that it takes me almost thirty minutes to walk to the Radcliffe Yard—it is usually only a short walk of less than ten minutes—I enjoy the trudging in fresh snow, especially as it has stopped snowing. When I eventually reach the yard, I am captivated by the serenity, which feels inviting and calm, and I wonder what sort of feeling might the snow-filled yard have given a young woman moving away from

54 As Ann Karnovsky cynically remarks in “Nostalgia and Promise” that, “Radcliffe women all rode bicycles to classes in the Yard, or to the library, which is now the Schlesinger. [. . .] It was only with the advent of the stronger sex in the Radcliffe Quad that the shuttle bus made its appearance” (236).

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home for the first time experiencing a winter storm at Radcliffe College. The pure untouched snow in the Radcliffe Yard is beautiful, while at the same time, I can see my footsteps in the snow as a literal sign of my archival path to the RCA. The physical experience of walking in heavy snow to the Radcliffe Yard adds to my archival journey, giving the historical figures of my research living presence that allows me to walk in their footsteps. On my way back to my dormitory, I pass the almost completed igloo on the lawn of Hastings Hall; suddenly, the vibration of my iPhone alerts me that, “Harvard University campus will be open again tomorrow.” Although I enjoyed the experience of a snow day, I am relieved that it is almost over as I am eager to get back inside the physical space of the RCA as soon as possible. The next morning, the day after the blizzard, my walk to the RCA is rather hazardous due to the ice that has formed on the paths and sidewalks. While there is no emergency calling me to the archives, I am keen on continuing my research process, but walking on slippery ice can be quite frustrating. When I eventually arrive at the SL, I hear the familiar voice of Sandy the librarian when I walk up the stairs. She addresses me happily: “Walking to the archives is quite a physical workout today, isn’t it? Welcome to the Northeast!” I nod in agreement and we both break out in a friendly laughter. Then she continues, “Speaking of physical workouts, you still have a ‘Physical Education’ folder on hold in the reading room. Do you still need it?” As I cannot recall putting a folder on hold, I am now anxious to see it. However, as soon as I spot the cream-colored folder, I remember that it is the one in which I found the Katharine Schroeder materials (see chapter V). In printed letters it says, “Physical Education, Series 1, Carton 1, 9. Clippings 1938-42, including dance clippings.” A few days earlier, I had put it aside as the folder contains leaflets on gym classes as well as a newspaper clipping on the controversies of the gym suit, a topic, which I explored many months earlier at the beginning of my archival journey. I decide to look at it again to see if I could throw further light on this dress topic.

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T HE R ETURN

OF THE

G YM -S UIT

As an archival researcher, I resonate with Elizabeth (Betsy) Birmingham who discusses how an author (or archivist) builds a relationship with her historical figures in her article, “‘I See Dead People’: Archive, Crypt, and an Argument for the Researcher’s Sixth Sense.” Basically, the archival process is like developing a friendship—getting to know someone or something over time, in the details of everyday life—not in the big concepts, but the everydayness of living. This distinguishes my archive stories from how I have experienced traditional historical writing in my past education. ßIndeed, I am now sensing how archival story-ing helps me imagine history and raises historical possibilities rather than cementing facts: Archival research uncovers questions that emerge from my encounters in the archives. A vivid and telling example of building a relationship with an archival source is the gym suit, an object of clothing that caught my attention since my first encounter with Eleanor Stabler Brook’s gym suit at the beginning of my archival journey (see chapter IV). Exploring archival materials in which women’s sports clothing is mentioned helps me to picture how young women at the turn of the century were changing their attitudes of what their bodies could do and how the make of their clothing allowed them the freedom of discovering these capabilities. When I open the “Physical Education” folder, I am anxious to see if the archival material will help me paint a larger historical picture of the dancing female body in higher education, a picture I started to create many months ago in my first archive story focusing on Eleanor Stabler Brooks and including aspects of her gym suit and how it served as an inroad to aspects of Radcliffe College’s physical education program during the 1910s. Further, this previously collected material opened captivating questions about how young women at the turn of the twentieth century might be developing new ideas and imaginings about their future roles in society. Now, as I read about the construction of the gym suit, I also imagine how the Radcliffe student filled out

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the athletic garment with movements and how these movement possibilities can open my research imagination. I am excited that a newspaper clipping with the promising title, “‘News’ Survey of Opinion Reveals Freshmen Denounce Gym Uniforms as Offensive to Feminine Vanity, Too Expensive,” (n.d., n.p.) appears to be source material that has the potential to garner further insights on the historical relevance of the gym suit. There is little doubt in my mind that this article was published in a Radcliffe student newspaper, as it cites Radcliffe College students voicing their opinion on the gym suit, but I begin to wonder about its publication date. As the article is filed in the “Physical Education, Series 1, Carton 1, 9. Clippings 1938-42, including dance clippings,” I assume that it has been published during this time period. However, when I start reading the first paragraph, a familiar name, Eleanor Stabler, makes it clear that this article must have been written in the 1910s rather than in the 1940s. It is in this moment that I realize how a misfiled source can change the course of an archival journey, a change that interrupts the chronological order I have tried to carefully sustain throughout my research. While the Dutch Manual for the Arrangement and Description of Archives (Muller, Feith, and Fruin) claimed that it is crucial to reestablish the original filing, classification, and record keeping systems used by the creator to elucidate particular and historical contexts of the materials for archival researchers, I become aware, however, that misfiling is a real possibility in any archive. However, I also realize that the misfiling brought the issue of the gym suit and its use by the Radcliffe students to the fore. I might have overlooked this if I had not been jolted by the disruption of chronology. The misfiling of the newspaper clipping raises interesting questions: What are the consequences of archival misfiling for archival researchers as well as for historical scholars? And, for me, in what direction shall I move with this query of chronological order in mind? While I am thrilled to revisit Eleanor as a familiar historical figure, I am faced with the dilemma that my current archive story now must

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move backward in time rather than progressing forward in chronological order. While I wish that I had found this source six months earlier, I am also fascinated by how it provides me with a way of connecting the first two narratives in a common theme, that is the uniform which would be worn to the Radcliffe dance classes and physical activities until the mid-century. My findings remind me of David Gold’s notion of “happy accidents” in his chapter on “The Accidental Archivist” in Beyond the Archives, where he asserts that: The process of doing archival research is largely organic. Though we may apply a critical lens or favor a particular theoretical approach, the basic methodology of archival research remains the same: read absolutely everything and try to make sense of what happened. It is a bottom-up process and messy as hell— and more to the point, scary, requiring faith that something will be found, even if it’s not what you first went looking for. (18)

While my archival experience is similar to those described by Gold, I also notice that the archival process is often cyclical in nature, allowing the researcher to rediscover related source material at various stages in the archival process. The discovery of more archival evidence of Eleanor’s gym suit well illustrates this point, demonstrating that the cyclical nature of source materials shapes the course of archive stories in which the researcher creates a web of archival information allowing a “dancing back and forth” between materials. While I still have some reservations concerning how the newspaper clipping will fit into my current archive story, I decide to explore it more deeply. In fact, what makes this survey so interesting and worth my time is the inclusion of Radcliffe student voices, providing some unique insights that are closely tied to the gym suit at Radcliffe College. As the newspaper clipping gives me a strong sense of the athletic costume as an obstacle and on-going issue in women’s physical education—a development that slowly progressed during the first half of the twentieth century, I decide to follow this lead.

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I F EEL L IKE AN E LEPHANT T RYING TO D ANCE IN T HEM When I start a close reading of the article, “‘News’ Survey of Opinion Reveals Freshmen Denounce Gym Uniforms as Offensive to Feminine Vanity, Too Expensive,” I notice that the most enticing aspects of the writing are the quotations from Radcliffe students. These voices clearly echo their strong opinions on the gym suit in the 1910s. They proclaim that there has been much discussion lately about college gym uniforms. Here the news brings you the voice of the people. They offend the feminine vanity and are too expensive, say the freshmen in the survey of public opinions on gym-suits. A few independents were outspoken in their approval: Eleanor Brooks: “They’re not so bad as the ones we had at school last year. They were orchid rompers.” Mary Harrington: “Comparatively comfortable, comparatively warm, and you can pull them down over your knees when it’s cold out. No serious objections.” Ruth Berman: “I think they’re very nice.” Mary Healy: “I like them. They’re a nice color—they make you feel you’re hot.” Mary Laughlin: “They’re a chisel. We could wear our last year’s gym suits and look nicer.” Betty Cornish: “I think they’re an awful job to get in and out of in a hurry.” Dorothea Kopsch: “I don’t have one but I think they’re pretty horrible.” Vesta Phillips: “Vile!”

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Lucille McClure: “They’re itchy.” Betty Canon: “We look silly in them. I feel like an elephant trying to dance in them.”

I break out in laughter when I read Betty Canon’s statement as I visualize a class of Radcliffe students looking like gigantic animals in their gym suits, a garment that impedes elegant movements and gracefulness usually associated with dance. Betty’s words give me a sense of the students’ experience and how the gym suit affected their physical activities. Although publications on sports clothing (Campell Warner and Paul) proved to be invaluable in establishing a foundation of my understanding of the gym suit, I am most appreciative of primary source material that allows me develop a better sense of how Radcliffe students actually felt about them and about how the students began discussing their desire for freedom of movement. The quotations that I pull from the article blaze a trail of research avenues by opening up a series of questions. In particular Betty’s statement, “I feel like an elephant trying to dance in them,” inspires me to imagine some of the possibilities of archival paths and the many narratives here in the RCA waiting to be written: What was the relation between dance and the gym suit at Radcliffe College? How did physical educators, and in particularly dance teachers, think about the gym suit? In what way did the gym suit make women think abut their bodies and what their bodies are physically capable of doing? What limitations did the gym suit impose and how did these limitations affect how the young women felt about moving? How did the gym suit affect their ideas about performance in front of an audience? Did they begin to think of dance as a performance of creative and artistic movement rather than a social statement about the mover? Could the gym suit have caused an exciting rebellion that spurred the students to question who they were as embodied persons in a new century? Without intending to, my archival path—and in particular the discovery of historical evidence that the gym suit was considered a perva-

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sive issue among Radcliffe students—raises broader questions about the culture of dance and physical activity at women’s colleges during the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth century. These questions provoke insights into how a newly defined physical culture for young women could disrupt expectations about how an educated young woman should behave and move within her world. Joan Paul’s chapter, “Agents of Social Control: The Role of Physical Educators as Guardians of Women’s Health, 1860-1960,” in Women Administrators in Higher Education points to some of the implications emerging in the twentieth century for the physically active woman: The more elite women attending college in the mid-to late-nineteenth century were raised in a society that conditioned them to remain indoors and engage in feminine pastimes such as sewing, painting, or playing the piano. Ill health was not only the common lot of upper-class women; many even considered it feminine. Because physical education promoted a more active life and required a trousered costume, people often considered it to be the antithesis of gentility. (190-1)

Joan Paul continues to note that there was a “need for special performance costumes in physical education” (190). Paul draws attention to the fact that, “There are stories from many institutions describing women sinking to the floor of the gymnasium in a heap, tears coming down their cheeks, huddling together and refusing to take part in the activities because of the shame of the ‘gym suit’” (190). Paul’s description makes me curious as to whether Radcliffe students also experienced the “shame of the gym suit.” Eagerly, I turn to the “Physical Education” folder in the hope of finding more archival evidence about my own imaginings.

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B RIDGING THE ARCHIVAL G AP Burrowing through the “Physical Education” folder is an experience that is simultaneously gratifying and disheartening. My efforts are fruitful as I find two leaflets that seem to be intended as guides for Radcliffe students on how to choose physical education classes at Radcliffe during the late 1930s, including a reminder to get fitted for gym suits. As primary source material often leaves an archival researcher with the task to bridge large gaps—in this case, the gap spans more than three decades—it seems important to get a better understanding of the broader historical context of the time period in question. My hope is that by viewing these primary sources together in their historical context, a whole will begin to take shape. The first “Physical Education 1938-39” leaflet (Series 1, Carton 1, 9. Clippings 1938-42, including dance clippings) tells the reader that: Physical Education is an important phase of education and should not be neglected. Try to make use of every opportunity to increase your skills and resources for enjoyment and leisure time, and regard the Physical Education as a privilege rather than a requirement. [. . .] Do you have your uniform complete and ready for use? Anyone wishing to order an outfit or needing alterations of the one you have should see Miss Edwards of Wright & Ditson’s at 3:30 in the rest room of the gymnasium immediately after this meeting. [. . .] The following sports will be offered this fall. Dancing is one of the finest types of exercise and expression, and is constantly growing in popularity. Two classes a week will be offered during the fall term for those interested in beginning the dance right away. Later on more classes will be added. The Dance Group is composed of members who show proficiency and interest in the dance.

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As I turn the page, I find another “Physical Education 1939-40” leaflet (Series 1, Carton 1, 9. Clippings 1938-42, including dance clippings) in which the information is updated, stating that: Physical Education is an important part of general education. It is a way of living. You should make use of every opportunity to increase your skills and resources for enjoyment and leisure time. Do you have your uniform here and ready for use? New orders and any alterations that are needed will be taken care of this afternoon immediately after this meeting. Go to the Exercise Room in the Gymnasium Building. Miss Edwards of Wright & Ditson will be there. It is important that you see her today if any changes are necessary. The following sports will be offered this fall: Dancing is one of the finest types of exercise and expression. Classes will be given beginning this fall for beginners, for the Junior and Senior Dance Groups, and a class in composition.

While piecing the information together about the changing attitudes concerning physical activity at Radcliffe, I am left with a gaping hole of several decades. At the same time, my information gathering raises fascinating questions enticing me to review further primary and secondary material as a way of dealing with these archival gaps. The questions that have taken shape include: How did dance and physical education evolve at Radcliffe College during the first half of the twentieth century? What source material is available to give me a better understanding of this time period? Since asking the archive staff about additional sources or suggestion was always very helpful, I turn to Sandy the librarian, who always gives the assistance I need when I am stuck in my archival journey. Indeed, Sandy suggests browsing the Harvard Radcliffe Online Historical Reference Shelf, a joint project of the Harvard University Archives and the Schlesinger Library, which provides open access to frequently consulted sources on the history of Harvard

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and Radcliffe. I am grateful for Sandy’s knowledge of archival holdings and her understanding of the scope of my research, and, following her suggestions, I begin my search with the Reports of the President. Reading through these reports during the next few days helps me to imagine the historical development of physical education at Radcliffe, leading me to new archival paths that I want to explore. While a full analysis of the history of physical education in women’s colleges does not have a place here, certain aspects are very relevant to bridge and illuminate the archival gaps that I have encountered. The first is the creation of a physical education program at Radcliffe College as the precursor of an extracurricular dance program. During the late 1800s, physical education was framed as “scrupulously scientific and medically supervised” (Ross 64) in order to shield it from male criticism and “by the end of the nineteenth century most women’s colleges had adopted some form of physical education and had built a gymnasium” (Ross 64). Radcliffe College was no exception to this trend. Indeed, in 1879, Dudley Allen Sargent, a former gymnastturned-medical doctor who had already taught gymnastics at Yale University two years earlier, joined Harvard’s faculty “knowing that many of the faculty disapproved of his status as an assistant professor of physical training” (Cottrell 33), especially after failing the examination of the Massachusetts Medical Society. However, despite his academic shortcomings, in 1881 the Society for the Collegiate Instruction of Women invited Sargent, who had the reputation as an authority on the physical well-being of American women (Cottell 33), to open a private gymnasium near the campus in Cambridge. The goal of Sargent’s appointment was “to provide structured physical activity programs” for Radcliffe students (Cottrell 33). Historians describe Sargent as a significant developer and leader of natural gymnastics in the early twentieth century (Cottrell; Hagood; Siedentop), someone who established the foundation for “women’s entrance into the world of sport and physical education [which] represented a critical breach in a long-standing barrier between women and

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physical activity” (Ross 59). James C. Whorton explains Sargent’s approach to women’s health as follows: The Sargent System that he instituted at Harvard’s soon to be famous Hemenway Gymnasium was structured around exercises on pulley-weight machines (many of Sargent’s invention) that could be adjusted to the strength of the individual and focused on the cultivation of specific muscles. The system also involved ‘mimetic exercises,’ more than fifty activities designed to imitate the movement of various forms of labor and sport. (283)

Indeed, Sargent’s emphasis on scientific approaches “provided fundamental direction” (Siedentop 27) for the emerging field of women’s physical education. The purpose of the Sargent System “amalgamated other systems into a scientifically defensible, comprehensive program of physical education” (Siedentop 33), which emphasized not only Calisthenics, German- and Swedish- style exercises, but also used specialized machine exercise apparatuses such as bars, rings, vaulting horses, ropes, ladders, parallel bars, specialized exercise machines in the gymnasium. In my imagination, I can certainly picture Radcliffe students engaging in these physical activities as well as the extent to which a gym suit must have been uncomfortable while doing these exercises. Further, I learn from the Radcliffe President’s Reports that Radcliffe College adopted a strictly scientific framework to implement physical education requirements in order to improve women’s health. For example, the Radcliffe President’s Report 1907-08 states that, the “result of the physical examinations showed that 36% of the 81 entering [Radcliffe] students had some degree of spinal curvature” (65), and as a result, special work in “Corrective Gymnastics” was given to ten of the number.55 From the “Dance at Radcliffe College” document, I find out that corrective gymnastics taught Radcliffe women “the cor-

55 The remaining students were identified with only “slight postural curves” (Radcliffe President’s Report 1907-08 65), which could be corrected with general work.

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rect way of standing, walking, sitting, and lying” (1). “Corrective gymnastics” would later, in 1925, become a movement class entitled “Body Mechanics” for “students whose posture was faulty” (1). By the late 1930s, “Body Mechanics” was fully integrated into Radcliffe’s curriculum, especially as the results were quantified and measurable. Gertrude C. Emery, Director of Physical Education, states: To this end during the first three weeks of indoor work a part of each gymnasium class was spent on the correct control of the body lying, sitting, standing, and walking. After the three weeks, the students who needed more help were given one, two or three periods a week in individual classes. The results of the year’s work may be best seen by the following chart of the posture grades of the class of 1929 in September 1925 and May 1926. The results were obtained from the regulation physical examinations and from the posture silhouettes made with the new silhouetteograph. The grades were all given by Miss Rawles, the instructor in posture and corrective work, who specialized in this branch of Physical Education, so that no variation for the gradings by different instructors need to be allowed. The result show the invariable drop from perfect posture, but a gratifying increase in better posture,--there being in May no grades of D-, E+ or E and an increase of from 40.5% to 81.50% between B+ and C. It would be well to have more than one year’s requirement in which to work with those who need more help, so that we could be sure that the improvement would be a more permanent rather than a temporary result (Radcliffe President’s Report 1925-26 35).

From my readings, I also learn that the early 1930s experienced a radical change in the compulsory physical education requirements at Radcliffe College as they turned from a required to a recreational activity for women. Starting in the academic year 1932-33, the Radcliffe College administration discontinued imposing an intensive program of corrective gymnastics on all its students. This development leaves me to wonder if young women were being made aware of exercises for correct physical posture earlier, for example through physical activity classes in secondary school. By college age, therefore, they no longer

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needed remedial help in the form of specialized correctional classes. According to Radcliffe College, however, the reason for the decrease in hours in “Body Mechanics” was that the majority of students wanted to concentrate their physical education on one specific activity in “which they accomplished more and could spend all their time in an activity they really enjoyed (Emery as quoted in Radcliffe President’s Report 1932-33 37).56 In the light of this information, I get a better understanding of why the “Physical Education 1938-39” leaflet (Series 1, Carton 1, 9. Clippings 1938-42, including dance clippings) describes “Physical Education as a privilege rather than a requirement” and the “Physical Education 1939-40” leaflet (Series 1, Carton 1, 9. Clippings 1938-42, including dance clippings) refers to physical activity as “a way of living,” in which women could enjoy physical freedom in the form of selective exercise. With the decline of corrective classes in the 1930s, the popularity of dance and gymnastics increased, although I learn that dancing and gymnastics was at this time a compulsory class. As Gertrude C. Emery, the Director of Physical Education noted, “It seemed unwise not to require some gymnastics or dancing because of their definite value in acquiring rhythm and body control (as quoted in Radcliffe President’s Report 1932-33 36).57 It is not surprising to find that both “Physical Education” leaflets advertise that, “Dancing is one of the finest types of exercise and expression.” As dance turned into a recreational activity at this time (even if compulsory), it also offered an arena in which a

56 Gertrude C. Emery reported, “The work in body mechanics, which had previously been given to all classes of freshmen at the beginning of the indoor season, was not given by one member of the Department this year, but was given by each instructor to her own classes in less concentrated form. The posture grades of the class as a whole seem not to have suffered from this method (Radcliffe President’s Report 1932-33 37). 57 Dancing and gymnastics, therefore, were required during the first winter term.

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student-led dance group, “for members who show proficiency and interest in the dance” (“Physical Education 1938-39”), could be formed. In a Report of College Officers, the Director of Physical Education, Gertrude C. Emery, states: The advanced dance group was active throughout the year, meeting one evening each week. In March its members joined with the group of beginners in dancing and with the tap dancers and gave a small demonstration of their work. In May this group was invited to be the guests of Bennington College for a week-end, to take part in a dance symposium. Ten of the students went with Miss Callahan and returned full of enthusiasm and plans for their work next year. The class in social dancing was more successful than last year, due, I believe, to the fact that girls who were good dancers were asked to help with the beginners. This made a larger group; and the girls not only had more fun, but progressed faster when dancing with good partners. (Radcliffe College. Reports of College Officers 1934-35 58)

At this point in my research, I am not surprised that dance groups as a social pastime boomed during the 1930s, as these group activities allowed women in higher education to develop their own culture, a gendered culture that was legitimized as “appropriate” for the female body. The physically active woman, who enjoyed dancing as a joyful leisure activity, expanded the freedoms for female students and furthered insights into how an active body might open new ways of living for a twentieth century woman. Emery’s report also raises interesting questions that imply an interest in dance that goes beyond Radcliffe’s philosophy of corrective gymnastics and rhythmic education. Radcliffe’s visit to Bennington College in North Bennington, Vermont, suggests a fascinating historical connection between these two institutions. While a detailed history of dance at Bennington would go beyond the scope of this research, it is important to shed light on certain aspects that are very relevant. Indeed, in 1932, Bennington started to offer a bachelor of arts degree with a concentration in dance, “the first such college degree emphasiz-

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ing dance as a performing art” (Ross 202). Janice Ross continues to explain: “Bennington’s emphasis on dance as an art from was cemented with the inauguration, in the summer of 1934, of the Bennington School of Dance” (Ross 203). In the light of this contextual information, the following questions arise: Did Miss Callahan work with the Bennington faculty? How was this connection made? To what extent was Radcliffe College influenced by Bennington’s educational ideas for valuing dance as an art form rather than only a physical activity to enhance the social graces of the mover? In particular, what did Radcliffe students learn and take with them when they “returned full of enthusiasm and plans for their work next year?” Again, my archival journey has opened an interesting array of questions for future research on dance education histories. While I embark on a spontaneous archival search to find more information on Miss Callahan, I hit a dead end, and after a few days, I eventually let it go. What intrigues me at this point, however, is the search for source material that will give me a better understanding of the history of Radcliffe’s student dance groups, an interest that has been sparked by my brief archival diversion. At the same time, my archival interest in student-led dance organizations coincides with my own active participation in dance groups at Harvard University, and thus, in the next few weeks, I set out to learn more about this archival theme.

L IVING THE H ISTORICAL C ONTEXT AS AN ARCHIVAL L EAD It is almost the end of February and the record snowfall that accompanied the start of my third archive story has long melted away. Time just flies when conducting archival research, and at this point in my journey, I am grappling with the question of how much time does one need to become acquainted with the subject: How much interaction is enough to get to know my historical subjects? From my previous ar-

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chival stories, I realize the importance of my physical presence of being-on-location, both in the archive as well as at the actual locations where dance was taught at Radcliffe College, to make better sense of the past as alive and constantly being reconfigured rather than statically represented. But how long does it take to get to know the historical figures whose stories I am trying to bring to light? In a quest to find answers to my questions, I stumble on Christine Mason Sutherland’s archive story “Getting to Know Them: Concerning Research into Four Early Women Writers” in Beyond the Archives. Sutherland’s story illuminates the importance of not only understanding, but also living the historical context. She states: Getting in touch—as much as possible—with the physical context in which women writers of the past worked involves visiting the places where they lived. Much has changed, of course, since they were alive. But as I hope to show, in some sense many of these women are still present in significant ways, even hundreds of years after their own lifetimes. (29)

The progression of my own archive story mirrors Sutherland’s advice on the importance of engaging in the historical context of dance at Radcliffe College. In particular, my extracurricular dance activities with student-led performing arts groups at Harvard University constitute an essential part of my archival journey (for a more detailed description of my dance activities at Harvard University, see my methodology in chapter III). In contrast to my previous archive stories, where my physical experience of Gesa E. Kirsch’s notion of “being on location” (20-7) embrace walking literally in the path of Radcliffe students, my interest in performing and choreographing becomes another dimension that acts as a guidepost for me when browsing through archival material at the RCA. Indeed, when I read about dancers in their environs, I take the memory of this reading into my own extracurricular dance activities at Harvard University. Performing as well as choreographing connects me to the past by establishing a form of shared experience that brings

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me closer to the historical figures that I find in the archive. In some sense, the dancing spirit of many of these women is still present in significant ways, even decades after their college years at Radcliffe. What I find most fascinating is that the archival information of dance groups represents the seed of a larger endeavor, one which establishes a historical connection between the past and the present. This connection gives the source material a living presence again as I am become a member of a Harvard student dance group. While Christine Mason Sutherland cautions that, “We are strangers in the past: we have to find our way about, learn the language, understand the culture, and sometimes come to terms with a very different set of values” (28), I am excited to explore source material of the past even if I have to come to terms with a different set of values from my own. The following section explores a vivid example of my lived experience in which I move back and forth between past and present, when I, as a male dancer and archival researcher, encounter a “different set of values” while “living the historical context” (Mason Sutherland 28-36) when stumbling upon a male student who was engaged in dance at Radcliffe College during the late 1950s. The next day when I pick up a new folder entitled “Dance Prior 1959” (DPE RG XV, Series 2, Carton 1, 15), I glance at the barrage of documents in the hope of finding source material that sheds light on student-led dance groups at Radcliffe College. The folder holds newspaper articles, memos, and letters, as well a few handwritten notes. However, what catches my attention is a typewritten document entitled “Radcliffe Dance Group Purposes 1957-58,” dated October 15, 1957. As I read these purposes and remember my own experiences creating statements of purpose and writing reports as a dance student, I am able to find a connection to the lived experiences of those voices speaking within those archives.

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Thus, when I discover the Radcliffe Dance Group’s statement of purpose, I get a sense that the group is speaking to me: This year the Radcliffe Dance Group definitely plans to help produce the Choral Society – Dance Group concert on November 21. It also looks as though by collaborations with other people and groups, notably musicians and composers, we will be able to put on some additional concerts at very little expense. [. . .] Our only income at the moment is from dues, as we have no backlog of profits from previous productions. Last year we found that it was possible, though not easy, to operate on what amounted to a total of about forty dollars. As we cannot expect to get as much as that in dues, we shall hope to collaborate with others in our productions until we can produce something and charge admission. (“Radcliffe Dance Group Purposes 1957-58,” dated October 15, 1957)

Although the historical evidence presented in this document is just a snippet of a potential archive story that explores the history of the Radcliffe Dance Group, it shapes yet another piece of my archival narrative. What I find the most intriguing about this source is the time period, 1957-58, which constitutes a significant milestone in Radcliffe College’s and Harvard University’s transition to extracurricular coeducation. Andrew K. Mandel aptly points out in “Feminism and Femininity in Almost Equal Balance” that, “In 1957 Harvard and Radcliffe agreed to allow joint extracurricular activities, a move previously stalled by Radcliffe administrators who feared that women would lose their sense of Radcliffe identity without separate activities” (222). In the light of Mandel’s comment, I begin to wonder if the Radcliffe Dance Group’s planned “collaborations with other people and groups” meant that they intended to work with male students from Harvard University, especially as “many [Radcliffe] students were pulled toward Harvard; men’s activities were more exciting, representing more opportunity and freedom” (Mandel 222). With this thought in mind, I turn back to the “Dance Prior 1959” folder, as I am anxious to learn if I can trace more source material to shed a brighter light on this issue.

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As I page further through the “Dance Prior to 1959” folder, I find a neatly typed memo stating the names of the Radcliffe Dance Group members during the fall term 1957-58. The names read: Karen Wilk, Adele Logan, Phoebe Steele, Elizabeth Theiler, Penny Carver, Jane Classen, Carla Washburn, Jane Cooley, Ruth Ann Rappaport, Lila Woodruff, Anne Lilley, Sharon Connolley, Penny Lukens, Ruth Emerson, John Holden. The last name on the list, John Holden, stands out as the only male student. Since I have previously associated dance at Radcliffe College with female students, I am excited, mostly as a current male dancer, to see a male student’s name as part of the dance group. As a man dancing in what is traditionally often considered a female arena, I sense how my archive story may now be shaped by my own experiences. While a detailed description of my past experiences in dance would go far beyond the scope of this research, it will be useful to provide a brief synopsis of my own dance training as a way of connecting it to the lived experience of John Holden. In its broadest and most traditional Western sense of concert ballet, dance is embodied in the form of female culture, and, inevitably, I as a male have first-hand experiences of what it means to enter this female dance world as a man. From an early age, I became aware that the dance I was studying—classical ballet—typically exemplified a gender-generated division in which females outnumber males in most settings. When I was a teenager growing up in Germany in the 1980s, I began ballet at a local dance school, as only one of the two boys I might add. In my late teens, I entered fulltime dance training in a ballet conservatory where female dancers still represented the majority of the student body. On the face of it, then, male dancers were—and still are—often marginalized in dance settings. Yet, there was something special about being a man in dance, in particular, as narratives in classical ballet productions required the casting of male roles. Hence,

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along with the marginalization came also the privilege that there were generally fewer men that competed for roles.58 Even though I eventually left the dance world to pursue a career in fashion journalism, I still felt strongly about dance. I could not help but notice the hype that surrounded the popularity of the male dancer; for example, in Matthew Bourne’s all-male cast for his contemporary ballet version of Swan Lake in 1995 or in the British dance drama of the aspiring young boy Billy Elliot in 2000.59 When I entered a postgraduate studies program in fashion history and theory (Master of Arts) at the London College of Fashion in England, I wrote my master’s thesis on Bourne’s use of gender roles in his version of Swan Lake. However, it was not until I started a postgraduate research degree in dance education program (Master of Philosophy) at London Contemporary Dance School in England, that I gained first-hand experience of an equal balance of males and females when I worked with undergraduate students in the dance studio. Here, I saw a complete new picture, at least in terms of gender differentiation within the norms of dance, an experience which was very different, yet also very exciting. This excitement brought a sense of energy as I felt that dance was heralding a new gender-balanced world. Today, almost a decade later, I still enjoy taking ballet classes at a recreational level, although I am certainly appreciative of my past experiences as a man in dance. Currently, at Harvard University, I am among a handful of male dancers taking ballet class, an experience—albeit different—which certainly relates me to John Holden at some level.

58 In this context, it is also important to note that men, however, were mostly given the role of choreographer. This split between men as dancers and men as choreographers, who did wield much power, is interesting. 59 In particular, Billy Elliot had a huge influence on males in the British dance world. For example, the Royal Academy of Dance set up a specific “Boys Only!” program, which aimed to promote the knowledge and practice of dance, particularly ballet, to young men aged 8 – 18 years.

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What this adds up to, then, is that my past experiences allow me to consider differing issues within the archive, issues that strike me specifically as a male in the dance world. I was and still am “living the historical context” (Mason Sutherland 28-36). Hence, my experiences in dance have the potential to bring aspects of gender issues to life as they connect with my own life. In the case of the memo stating the names of the Radcliffe Dance Group members, I find John Holden’s name intriguing as the discovery marks the possibility that I can not only bring to light some of the coeducational challenges that the Radcliffe College dance program faced during the late 1950s when Radcliffe women officially began to dance with Harvard men, but I also can view this issue from my perspective as a male in dance.60

C ONNECTING TO J OHN H OLDEN Making connections between primary sources and secondary literature represents a fundamental part of my archival journey, and, at this point, it seems essential to throw light on the historical context of this time period. Indeed, the late 1950s represents an era in which a slightly more gender-balanced college life between Harvard University and Radcliffe College was achieved as both institutions agreed to allow joint extracurricular activities. Andrew K. Mandel views this agreement as a “social merger” (222), in which female students were seemingly fully integrated into the college life at Harvard. While Mandel describes the 1950s as a period of “togetherness” (224), there was still a strong separatist sentiment, in which female students were continuously struggling to secure an equal place at Harvard. Interestingly, the pool of available literature portrays the integration as a “one-way movement,” in which Radcliffe students aspired to be integrated into

60 I use the term “officially” to emphasize the fact that it was only in 1957 that Harvard University and Radcliffe College both agreed to allow joint extracurricular activities in 1957 (Mandel 215-26).

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Harvard clubs rather than Harvard men seeking admission to Radcliffe student groups. However, my discovery of John Holden as a member of the Radcliffe Dance Group in the fall term 1957-58 demonstrates that male Harvard students—or at the very least one single student— showed interest in dance as an extracurricular activity at Radcliffe College, especially as there were no dance clubs offered by Harvard University. When I imagine John dancing with the Radcliffe College Dance Group, a kind of tape loop begins running through my head as I attempt to make meaning out of what I discovered in the archives. Picturing this group, I have no doubt that there is something special about John as the only male member of a student-led dance group in the setting of a women’s college. Although I have to come to terms with a different set of values from the past, I certainly can relate to John’s ambition to become part of the Radcliffe College Dance Group. I envision John as a passionate young man, who joined the dancing women at Radcliffe College to avidly pursue his interest in the performing arts. The newly merged extracurricular activities gave him the opportunity and freedom to become an integral part of the Harvard-Radcliffe merger, although it is likely that his choice was considered as highly unusual and, hopefully, progressive for the time period.61 Whereas “many [Radcliffe] students were pulled toward Harvard” (Mandel 222), John was pulled toward Radcliffe. As the only male dancer among fourteen young women, John had entered an arena that was labeled as feminine and a once-exclusive community. While I can only speak to my experience as a member of the student-led Harvard Ballet Company, it is certainly interesting to note that the forty dancers in the company are predominantly female, with only a handful of male dancers. This present-day experience allows me not only to gain a sense of John’s experience, whose interest in dance certainly fueled the emergence of a male presence in the history of dance

61 In fact, John may have faced many other issues during this time period, issues that might be brought to light in another archive story.

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at Harvard-Radcliffe, but also helps me to find a historical connection to the lived experiences of those voices speaking within those archives. In order to help this process along, it seems essential that I next become acquainted with the gradual progress of gender inclusion in Harvard-Radcliffe’s history. Figure 4: Dance Group Workshop, May 1957, featuring “Spike.” Foreground kneeling: Edith Churchill, Ruther Emerson. Standing: Spike Holden. Background: Liz Theiler, Penny Carver, Jane Classen, Lise Vogel (blocked). Courtesy of the Radcliffe College Archives, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University (Radcliffe Archives TC 100-2-29).

Although I hit a dead end in my initial search for John “Spike” in 2011, eventually I found this image in 2012. This proves the importance of the archive as an archival histories-in-the-making, in which new sources and keyword searches are added, allowing archival researchers and historians to construct more detailed histories (see post-scriptum).

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E XPLORING G ENDER WITHIN THE H ISTORY OF H ARVARD -R ADCLIFFE In the introduction to Yards and Gates, Lauren Thatcher Ulrich vehemently claims: “Womanless history has been a Harvard specialty” (3). The emphasis on men can be seen by looking at different time periods, providing a chronological order of how a Harvard education throughout the centuries was ultimately geared towards the education of men until the mid-twentieth century. In his essay “Creating a Fellowship of Educated Men,” Conrad Edick Wright investigates the American prerevolutionary era of Harvard in the eighteenth century, drawing light on Harvard’s rigorous approach of educating cultured and sophisticated men. Wright asserts that: The boys were in Cambridge for a reason—to be set apart from the rest of New England Society. Four years at Harvard College in a highly structured, almost entirely male community would transform their lives, they believed, turning them into educated men. At the start of this journey they were callow and unformed; by its end they hoped to leave college as gentlemen. (17)

Wright’s words demonstrate Harvard’s idea about educated manliness as an important virtue for students, a part of their life, which was considered as “a never-ending commitment to personal improvement and social order” (Wright 22). Harvard University had not only the responsibility for a student’s intellectual direction, but also for their cultural education. While Wright’s essay provides ample evidence of how a Harvard education profoundly promoted the formation of gentlemen, what is particularly interesting for my archive story is Wright’s brief narration of the existence of dance classes for Harvard students. Indeed, during the 1800s, a Mr. Peter Curtis, local instructor of French, “also taught dancing, a subject that included etiquette, though he offered this instruction across the river in Boston without the approval of the College government” (25).

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A Harvard education, then, did not only entail intellectual stimulation, but also prepared men for a social life. Wright continues: Dancing class provided the students with an opportunity, which they savored, to meet girls of their own age. Twice a week between 1771 and 1774 boys and girls from Boston’s finest families, together with a representation of Harvard undergraduates, gathered at Curtis’s school on Queen Street to learn how gentlemen and ladies carried themselves in polite society. From courtly forms of address to the steps of reels, cotillions, and gavottes, dancing masters like Curtis showed their students the conventions of public intercourse in the eighteenth-century Anglo-America’s most refined circles. Of these, instruction in the minuet was perhaps the most important because of the risk the dance presented for public humiliation. In the most elevated social circles, every assembly began with a minuet. Each couple danced it alone in turn before the critical eyes of the rest of the company. A man who could not perform a creditable minuet, Harvard students knew, instantly and publicly revealed himself not to be a gentleman. (25)

It seems fascinating to think of social dances as a tool to transform Harvard boys into gentlemen, while at the same time, “Harvard officials considered young women both a temptation and distraction” (Thatcher Ulrich 11) for centuries. One of the crucial things to consider, then, is that during the eighteenth century, dance played a role in the life of male students at Harvard, although the emphasis was on learning the cultural and social etiquette rather than engaging in dance as an art form per se. During the nineteenth century, “an age that valued robust masculinity in men” (Hoganson 117), Harvard’s quest to transform boys into cultivated gentlemen was still in full force, though there was an even stronger emphasis on manliness and virility. Kristin Hoganson’s essay titled “Harvard Men: From Dudes to Rough Riders” demonstrates how during this time period, Harvard developed a reputation of fostering a “more vigorous manhood among wealthy white men” (Hoganson 119),

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who excelled in strenuous collegiate athletics and showed their fighting spirit through military enlisting. As Hoganson points out: Military service regendered Harvard men, transforming them from symbols of effeminacy to symbols of powerful masculinity. This new association with militant manhood helped give them credibility necessary to lead in the dawning years of the twentieth century. (126)

The emphasis on nurturing virility exemplifies Harvard University’s prevalent ideas about manliness during the nineteenth century, ideas that changed at the turn of the twentieth century, when Harvard moved away from educating the “manly man.” Indeed, the first decades of the new century saw Harvard men transforming into “dudes,” who were “educated, professional, and well-to-do; urban, dandified, soft, and elitist” (Hoganson 117). However, the 1950s experienced “the growth of a large and healthy program of intramural athletics” (Bethell 191), a development that again further fostered the idea of the athletic male body. These differing ideas of manliness in relation to body expression over the centuries is very interesting especially when related to the idea of dance classes in the 1950s, classes that seemed to emphasize artistic and graceful aspects of the female students at Radcliffe College. In order to contextualize and recreate the gendered landscape of Harvard-Radcliffe during the mid-twentieth century, the time period where John Holden joined the Radcliffe Dance Group, it seems useful to also bring to light memories of women students about how they experienced the gender divide. In Laurel Thatcher Ulrich’s Yards and Gates, short memoires of Radcliffe alumnae provide snapshots of “midcentury memories” of the separatist life of females at Radcliffe College and Harvard University. For example, in her short essay, “10,000 Men of Harvard,” Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumna Eva S. Moseley narrates that during the 1950s, “It was, at any rate, a lot of men per woman, especially in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences” (239). In hindsight, Mosley reflects on her expe-

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rience as a graduate student in Sanskrit and Indian Studies at Harvard University: How typical were my view and expectations of men at Harvard? They were to some extent typical of the 1950s. Much as I detested the political timidity and general conformity of that decade, I was typical in my assumption that la difference is of ultimate significance in relations between the sexes, division of labor, and everything else. (244)

Without doubt, Mosely’s narration of her memories brings the elite and male sense of entitlement of Harvard men to the foreground, showing how separatism was still very common during this time period. Another Radcliffe alumna, Ann Karnovsky, describes in her essay “Nostalgia and Promise” that during the 1950s, Radcliffe was not only separate but also unequal in comparison to Harvard. Karnovsky remembers that: Harvard Houses served ice cream every day; we had it only on Sundays. Harvard still had “biddies” to clean the rooms and staff to serve. Of course, tie and jacket were mandatory in the Houses at meals. Harvard men, because of postwar space shortages, were “crowded four to a suite, sharing two bedrooms, a living room that often had a fireplace, and a bathroom. In the Quad, many socalled emergency doubles originally meant for one person now accommodated two. A whole floor of perhaps 20 women shared one bathroom, with two toilets, four washstands, and two baths or showers. It certainly was an unequal situation, but resentment of our lack of privacy did not include resentment of Harvard. We just wished that Radcliffe would improve conditions. (Guess what? Conditions were not improved until men moved into the Quad, and even then, not immediately.) (235)

Though Karnovsky’s memoir demonstrates that Harvard-Radcliffe was far from equal in many aspects of living conditions and comforts, the late 1950s did open new connections between men and women through the sharing of the rich extracurricular activities starting in 1957. Given

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the historical tradition of strict separatism, the presence of a man in Radcliffe’s dance program was certainly a new—and probably a highly controversial—development, showing how changing social norms affected both genders. John’s experiences at Radcliffe College during this period of change are certainly an exciting lead. Viewing the source material in the context of the history of gender at Harvard-Radcliffe allows me to continue imagining the dance life of John Holden as a member of the Radcliffe Dance Group.

C OEDUCATIONAL I SSUES IN THE R ADCLIFFE G YMNASIUM From an archival perspective, the initial discovery of John Holden opens up a whole series of questions in my mind about the gendered aspect of dance in terms of women in sex-segregated colleges. As I imagine John as a dancing man at Radcliffe College, the following questions come up: How visible was John as part of the Radcliffe Dance Group? Were there other male Harvard students interested in dance at Radcliffe College during this time period? If so, is there more source material available or did these students not make their way into the Radcliffe College Archives? Again, archival story-ing opens new territories for future research avenues. At a broader level, I am curious to learn about the role of male Harvard students at Radcliffe College who, after the social merger of extracurricular activities, were allowed to participate in Radcliffe clubs. What kind of issues arose as part of the coeducational extracurricular activities? I try to imagine how John Holden fit into this mold and how his participation in the Radcliffe Dance Group possibly influenced the shaping of dance as a coeducational activity at Radcliffe College. These questions have the potential to open up my research into a completely new direction in which I could explore the effects of coeducation on dance in higher education.

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With this new search trajectory in mind, I return to the “Dance Prior 1959” folder and locate a letter from Harriet L. Clarke, Director of Physical Education, addressed to Miss Ruth Emerson, dated October 15, 1957: Dear Ruth: Since I have not had a chance to talk to you about the extra hours that Dance Group wishes to use the Gymnasium, I think I had better write you about one item and get it straight from the beginning. The Radcliffe Gymnasium was built before the days of Radcliffe-Harvard joint education and, consequently, has no facilities for men. For that reason there will have to be a definite understanding about where and when Spike uses it. Will you please see that he understands that the only part of the building suitable for joint use is the Gymnasium itself at the time of class. There is no place for him to dress in this building, and the toilet facilities are for women only. So if he can be dressed when he comes, and use the Gymnasium at class time only, then the swimming and other classes will not be embarrassed by meeting him in other places around the building. For the use of Room C and the Gymnasium at times other than class time for Radcliffe members of Dance Group, please sign the times and dates in the office. Sincerely, Harriet L. Clarke Director of Physical Education

I am awed by the information presented in this letter as I had neither anticipated nor suspected this source material from Radcliffe College’s history to be worthy of saving. In my archival narration, John “Spike” Holden serves as archival evidence proving the existence of dancing male students at Radcliffe College. Clearly, Clarke’s letter represents an example of the challenges that emerged from the joint extracurricular activities. In this source, I foresee an opportunity for contributing

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something new to the question of gender issues emerging when male students entered the territory of a women’s college during this time period. Clarke’s letter uncovers an aspect of the consequences of joint extracurricular activities that are related to but separate from “providing women access to a once-exclusive community” (Mandel 224). Rather, as an archival source, this letter helps me not only to imagine the complications that arose when a male student was seeking access to a domain that was once reserved for females only, but also to view John in the context of Harvard’s long and shifting history of what it meant to be an educated man. It also begs the question as to what extent Radcliffe College accommodated the needs of male students to participate in coeducational activities and how the Radcliffe Dance Group integrated male students into their student-led organization.

D ANCING T OGETHER

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E LEPHANTS

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The end of the spring semester not only brings this archive story to a close, but it also closes my search into the mystery of John’s involvement in dance from 1956-57. A report from the Radcliffe Dance Group, handwritten by Ruth Emerson, tells that, “New officers were elected for next year: president Ruth Emerson and business manager John Holden” (“Dance Prior 1959”). I am surprised to learn about John’s appointment to an executive position in the Radcliffe student organization, especially as many Radcliffe women struggled to be elected into higher positions in Harvard clubs where they were often limited to secretarial roles. Unlike Harvard organizations, however, the Radcliffe Dance Group appears to see value not only in letting a male join the club, but also in electing him to its executive board. As many Radcliffe clubs folded when members joined Harvard organizations, it is questionable to what extent John’s appointment was a necessary step to sustain the Radcliffe Dance Group whose fate was perhaps seen as threatened by the extracurricular merger. Indeed, Ruth’s report reveals

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that the dance group struggled financially to produce performances. Her report states: The Dance Group did not give its annual choral concert this year. We do not feel that we are able to put together any sort of production in the Fall before December [. . .]. In the Spring we decided to give our own concert in Agassiz Theatre (March 21) of dances we had done ourselves. We did not feel that we could charge admission [. . .]. We paid for Agassiz for one evening rehearsal and the performance evening. We bought materials for costumes in Boston and for posters and programs in the square. We overran the money we had, and charged each person in the Dance Group .70 to make up for it. It was an awful struggle at the same time and publicity was not done well enough [. . .]. (“Dance Prior 1959”)

In the light of this archival evidence, it is certainly possible to imagine John’s appointment as business manager to be a coeducational attempt to literally “balance the books.” In fact, the newly merged activities meant that many Radcliffe organizations had to fight to secure an equal place at the Harvard-Radcliffe table, and the dance group was certainly no exception. The extracurricular merger meant a change for all students—regardless of their gender—during a time period in which student organization were pushed to embrace coeducational communities, resulting in restructuring of existing groups and the formation of new ones.62

62 While my archive story does not investigate Radcliffe College’s dance history beyond 1958, it is interesting to note that this development certainly undermined Radcliffe’s own identity, resulting that many old activities where either ceased to exist or merged with Harvard organizations. Marcia G. Synnott describes the effects of the social merger in her essay “The Changing ‘Harvard Student:’” “By 1960 only the Athletic Association and the Christian Fellowship survived among Radcliffe’s original group of independent extracurricular activities. By 1968-1969, only the Choral Society remained a Radcliffe organization” (203).

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While it is important to recognize that Radcliffe College’s joint extracurricular activities with Harvard University enabled John to become a member of the dance group, more importantly, it must also be seen as a pivotal turning point in Radcliffe’s dance history, a time in which Radcliffe women danced with men. In this regard, my archival search found lost voices and brought to life some of the intricate gender issues facing Radcliffe dance students at that time. There is no doubt that dance at Radcliffe College maintained a female identity since dance was and probably still is labeled a female arena despite being in the company of male students. From my own perspective as a male in dance, it is fascinating to think that John was an integral part of this time period and that he not only helped change the landscape of dance at Harvard-Radcliffe, but that he also paved the way for other male dancers like myself. It is certainly true to say that John disrupted restrictive societal norms at Harvard-Radcliffe, norms that were shaped by a traditionally male-dominated views on higher education. As an archival researcher, I see an intricate relationship between John’s presence at Radcliffe College in the past and my current research that brings to light some of these lost male voices in a period of coeducational change. There is a closeness of some kind, a shared experience of entering a territory that was once reserved for women, which brings me closer to the historical figures that I attempt to illuminate in my archive stories. While my narrative comes to an end, I get a sense that I have given John a living presence again as the man who danced with Radcliffe women. An interesting aspect of my archive story is that I elevate pieces of the historical discourse of gender in higher education by drawing attention to one—or possibly several—male students who participated in coeducational dance activities at a women’s college. While my archival narrative offers only a snapshot from this particular history in time, it demonstrates the value of archival storying, as it allows me to look at the history of dance at Radcliffe College and to further bring to light new ways of thinking about archival re-

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search and historical writing. While most of the writing on gender in the history of Radcliffe College and Harvard University deals with the complexity and marginality of women, my archive story gives voice to a male student participating in dance at a women’s college, an area that was and still is significantly under-researched. This chapter then demonstrates how my archival journey at the Radcliffe College Archives gives insights into how both men and women were questioning limitations put on their bodies by enforced gender roles. What is significant about this archive story is how the first half of the twentieth century opened new ways for people to think about their bodies outside of the modes developing in the past. The first part of this archive story shows how at the turn of the century women students began questioning how their bodies could move and how their bodies could be dressed to move. The second part of this archive story shows how mid-century male students began questioning how they could participate in areas that had been restricted to them as they were labeled as female pastime. Connection these two parts provides insights into how both men and women were questioning limitations put on their bodies by enforced gender roles and how they navigated and moved through forty years of restrictive spaces at Radcliffe College.

VI. Conclusion Expanding the Possibilities of Writing Histories

And, for me, how to end this story. I’m clearly not nearly done with the scholarly issues here, haven’t even really begun clearly articulating a methodology. But I am at the end of this story, a narrative that recounts— that tells—in an effort to mean affectively. (POWELL 123)

H OW N OT

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E ND

AN

ARCHIVE S TORY

The above quotation from Malea Powell’s archive story, “Dreaming Charles Eastman,” articulates a common query for those engaged in archival story-ing: How to end a story? My archive stories from the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) at Harvard University’s Schlesinger Library (SL) demonstrate the diverse and unpredictable paths of archival research that I walked during my journey in the search for dance histories. Similar to Powell’s observation, my archive stories are just the beginning of endless possibilities to explore the source material that I found within my journey. However, clearly, each of my narratives not

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only sheds light on a historical event or figure bringing to life some of the major issues facing women at Radcliffe College during the first half of the twentieth century, but each also expresses the complexity and importance of the archival process as a way of opening new readings of histories and historiographies. My quest to discover lost histories of dance at Radcliffe College represents a process that continues to explore and put into practice current and cutting edge theories about the archival research process. In doing so, the archive stories that I created attest to the value of storying the archival experience as a tool to elucidate the researcher’s actual encounter with archives and archival sources as an invaluable methodological approach to writing histories. Thus, rather than asking the daunting question of how to end an archive story, I believe it is more important to ask how not to end an archive story. Instead, I ask yet another question: How do I now find meaning within the diverse stories that emerge in the process of my telling? It is crucial to realize that archive stories are constantly evolving and shifting in a dynamic fashion: they embrace and highlight diverse points of view into source materials rather than presenting them as stagnant moments within a stable historical account. The traditional approach to historiography tends to focus on “telling the historical truth,” portraying historical events and figures within a solid chronology and seemingly representing the history rather than uncovering possible histories, especially those histories that have not received value within specific cultures. Therefore, in my narratives for this research, I attempt to raise questions that hopefully stimulate new and possible insights into the nature and use of archives and the archival process as well as the possible meanings this process might uncover. Thus, archive stories do not, nor should they, end. Rather, they provide evolving possibilities into how readings might unfold given the detailed and rigorous “digging” of the archival researcher into the source material within the context of the archival environment, or, what I now coin as a “living site of knowledge.” With this purpose in mind, my archival narratives propose to demonstrate how the stories

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are not limited to explaining the actual physical archive; instead, they are meant to open possibilities into new and untold historical readings. As Antoinette Burton rightly explains: Taken as a whole, Archive Stories [the anthology] contends that the claims to objectivity associated with the traditional archive pose a challenge which must be met in part by telling stories about its provenance, its histories, its effect on its users, and above all, its power to shape all the narratives which are to be “found” there. What follows, in other words, are not merely histories or genealogies or archives or “the archive” but, rather, self-conscious ethnographies of one of the chief investigative foundations of History as a discipline. (6)

Reflecting on my archival experience, I find that archive stories further thrive in the lived experience of the researcher to include personal encounters with the surroundings of the archive and personal interpretations and readings of what is found. How the researcher then brings these stories to life through his or her own personal interpretations and further uncovers new possible interpretations for the reader becomes the purpose of the archival process and what keeps the stories never ending. Therefore, an archive story does not pretend to “finish” a subject’s story, but it brings aspects of it to life as the researcher becomes acquainted with this life over time. The researcher’s responsibility is to bring forth the rich detail within these stories, to open possible new connections within the context in which the stories live, and to demonstrate for the reader how even further historical stories might develop as the reader creates his or her own narratives from the archival material. The archival researcher must, therefore, not only provide depth of detail, but also methods for analyzing the detail so that the reader can develop and perhaps tell different stories. From a methodological point of view, it is vital for the archival researcher to constantly question the source material and how it has been situated within the archive as well as how the archive has been further situated within an institution. This process of non-ending questioning provides space for the emerging archive stories to continually grow in

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multiple directions. An archive story only comes to an end when both the archival researcher and the reader of the research stop questioning the source material. It is thus crucial to recognize archival story-ing as a tool, given by the researcher to the reader, to provide methods for connecting personal and unique insights into how histories can be given meanings from numerous points of view. However, the believability of a storied view is tied to the rigor of finding good questions arising from in-depth digging into the archival source and the place within which it lives and is situated.

T HE ARCHIVE

AS A

L IVING -S ITE - OF -K NOWLEDGE

One of the major implications of this research is to recognize the archive not as a repository of historical information, but as a site in which the development of new knowledge about possible histories comes to life and what I call a living-site-of knowledge. The first archive story featuring Eleanor Stabler Brooks, “The Strongest girl in Radcliffe,” attempts to demonstrate that an archival researcher needs to identify where the life of an archive is fully detailed and where it is less clear. Based on this evaluation, the researcher must then be prepared to broaden the scope of the archival search in order to discover where uncharted paths might lead. The archival researcher, therefore, does not put aside material if it does not follow an original research plan; rather, the plan takes shape in the process of discovering where the archival source might lead. Exploring first-hand what an archive can give a researcher is a crucial task in archival research. The content of an archive, of course, cannot be easily framed within the information found in the archive’s finding aids, as these only list the quantity of archival items rather than the quality of these sources. In fact, my own archival encounter with Eleanor in the Radcliffe College Archives (RCA) deeply resonated with David Gold’s “The Accidental Archivist: Embracing Change and Confusion in Historical Scholarship,” as the discovery of archival

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sources was often unexpected chance encounters. Although I was aware that the RCA is not a dance archive, I had hoped to find more dance materials, especially as an initial search using the keyword “danc*” indicated dozens of hits for the time period, the early twentieth century, to which I had confined the scope of my early archive story. I soon learned that, while a keyword—such as “danc*”—can be found in a particular archival source, it does not follow that the archival source, once it is in my hands, provides sufficient contextual information allowing me to situate “dance” within a larger historical context. For example, much of the material classified as “danc*” turned out to be only tangentially related to dance with a stronger focus on physical education and athleticism. As the archival researcher, I then chose to follow this athletic tangent by looking at the gym costume worn in these physical activities, a topic of personal interest as a costume and fashion historian. This trajectory led me into new questions about how these young women at the turn of the century were restricted in movement and how they proceeded to rebel against these restrictions. Even though this topic was not specifically about dance, the material did open up questions about how notions about and experiences of the female body moving in space were changing during this time period. Thus, it is important to realize that an archive can open up a variety of leads, specifically leads the researcher did not originally plan to explore. It is this living-site-of-knowledge, a place in which knowledge can unexpectedly shift and change that shapes the act of archival storying. Eleanor Stabler Brooks’s archive story, in which I broadened my net to physical education and athletics—activities that are related to dance, but that do not represent dance per se—constitutes a vivid example of how a narrative evolves based upon the sources found in the archives. While I initially felt that an exploration of Eleanor’s physical education would lead me too far away from dance, I gradually learned that following these leads allowed me to gain insights into a time period in which dance in higher education slowly emerged from physical

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education programs. Conducting this research, I felt close to Elizabeth Birmingham’s archival experience recounted in her essay, “‘I see Dead People’: Archive, Crypt, and an Argument for the Researcher’s Sixth Sense,” as I developed a close relationship with the leads as they inspired and “spoke to me.” These leads took me on an archival journey, in which I gained a sense of women’s emerging physicality during the early twentieth century, unfolding a series of findings that allowed me to create a picture of and discover possible meanings for Eleanor’s role as “the strongest girl in Radcliffe.” Recognizing the development of this archive story, where the focus shifted from dance to physical education, as a path often blessed with what David Gold refers to as “happy accidents” (13), is a major aspect of this type of archival research. To fully benefit from the archive as a living-site-of-knowledge, the researcher must be prepared to go along and fully explore those moments, bring the richness of the details to life, and then present them to the reader in a manner that sparks his or her imagination to find and explore even more research paths and new historical possibilities.

T HE ARCHIVE -O UTSIDE - THE -ARCHIVE The notion of what I coin the archive-outside-the archive is a reoccurring major theme in my research in which the complexities of archival research are demonstrated when the investigation is not just limited to the physical archive, but also includes the archival surroundings. In the second archive story, in which I explored Katharine Schroeder as “the teacher who danced with knives,” I discovered how Gesa E. Kirsch’s notion of “being on location” (20-7) for the archival researcher is an invaluable asset. This on-site experience allowed me not only to investigate the primary sources found in the archive, but to also gain a “lived experience” of the archival surroundings as I developed connections between the archival findings and the actual location where the historical figure lived. I was able to literally dance in the spaces in

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which Katherine danced and be surrounded by the photos capturing images of her dancing life at Radcliffe. While narrating Katharine’s archive story, I reflected on Gesa E. Kirsch’s notion of exploring the “hidden historical figure,” a notion of particular use when working with Katherine’s archival story-ing. Similar to how Gesa E. Kirsch describes “what it means to walk in the footsteps of a historical subject” (20), my own archival journey blossomed when I became an active member of the Harvard dance community. As an archival researcher working on location for an extended period of time, I tried to create rich and detailed descriptions of the spaces in which Katherine practiced her dance art and teaching in order to bring these spaces outside of their hidden place within the folders and filing cabinets of the Radcliffe Colleges Archives (RCA). More importantly, I used these descriptions, made from my point of view as a German dance scholar with a strong ballet aesthetic, to hopefully entice my readers to make further connections between their own experiences with American dance history and American social history as they further opened new insights into historical readings. This second archive story serves as a reminder that archival sources, and in particular the way in which records have been archived, indexed, and organized, are never a complete reflection of what a researcher might discover. Studying not only the archival sources and the ways in which these have been archived, but also physically exploring the surroundings and the actual locations in which the historical figure danced, lived, and worked allows a researcher to create a more informed archive story, one that embraces wider conversations into what the past might tell us. Thus, an investigation of the archive-outside-thearchive sculpts the ways in which archival story-ing extends the definition of an archive beyond the physical space and explores how the archival surroundings can be interpreted and re-interpreted as part of an archive. Further, at times, an archival researcher may need to interface directly with the surroundings of the physical archives, especially as “being on location” (Kirsch 20-7) can contribute to building a more inti-

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mate relationship with the artifact, thus creating a history that is lush and rich in details. The interactions with the archival surroundings are then essential for archival researchers to develop a more nuanced sense of the everydayness of historical events, how those events were archived, and how the archival researcher experiences and, therefore, brings to life the source material for the reader to experience and reinterpret. Indeed, the physical encounters emerging from “being on location” (Kirsch 20-7) are like to have a profound effect on how the archival researcher comes to grasp and appreciate the histories and the context in which these histories are created. This researcher appreciation will then, hopefully, offer future dance historians new spaces in which to discover untold historical stories. The archive-outside-the-archive became a vital part of my archive story into a portrayal of Katherine as an innovative teacher who could engage the talents and interests of students as performers of a new American dance. Indeed, the archival process of “being on location” (Kirsch 20-7) and exploring the archive-outside-the-archive was similar to developing a friendship, in which I got to know my historical figure within the physical context of her archived history of dance at Radcliffe College. She, in a sense, also became my teacher. Writing archive stories, then, represents a creative way to bring primary sources to life by experiencing the possibilities of historical interpretation and then portraying images of these experiences within the context of the archival environment.

T HE ARCHIVE AS ARCHIVAL H ISTORIES - IN - THE -M AKING The archive stories that I created also demonstrate that archival narrating represents a discovery of histories-in-the-making. Archival research is an ongoing process, in which one is often left with unanswered questions. These questions can, in turn, open research trajectories that shed light on new methods for researching history. Indeed, it

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is vital to recognize that an archival researcher brings a narrative to life by choosing to highlight specific historical events, figures, and themes. These choices, and the basis for making them, are then made evident to the reader by the archival researcher, who openly acts as a story creator and story shaper portraying his or her living connection with the archival material. Again, the point of this methodology is not to present the archival researcher’s experience as the truth, but to provide a methodology for the reader to develop her or his own possible stories through connections from their own personal historical situations. The archival researcher, therefore, sets the groundwork and establishes a geographical overlay from which new research possibilities and insights might come to life. This notion of archival histories-in-the-making became apparent in my third archive story, “From Dancing Elephants and Men at Radcliffe.” In this chapter, I showed how I, as an archival researcher, can choose what to highlight in my archival narration and how these choices consequently shape the writing of my histories. My academic interest in fashion and costume history as well my personal experiences as a man in dance led me to focus on two aspects of the archives: the Radcliffe College gym suit and the male Harvardian entering the female Radcliffian dancing space. In this archive story, I portrayed how both men and women moved through societal restrictions in order to create their own paths, no matter if these paths were deemed “right” by those in charge. Further, I attempted to demonstrate how decisions and paths not deemed right or important might become lost to historical record and how an archival researcher might then bring these lost histories into the light. While at first glance, the two aspects I chose to narrate, that of female costuming and the role of dancing men in American academe, do not tie together per se, they do provide meaningful insights into the decisions I made about how I chose to emphasize specific archival information in my stories. While moving through the archives and the various stories emerging, I was becoming aware of how the everyday actions of historical figures were often in rebellion with what were con-

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sidered societal norms. These were not major political revolts, but dayby-day activities that led to further disruptions in a simple picture of what young women and men were and wanted to be in turn of the century America. Therefore, I saw the stories of dancing elephants and men as not just two separate stories, but stories showing a similar type of empowerment from two sides of the coin. As an archival researcher, the chosen source material reflects a vivid connection from my past to my living presence in the Radcliffe College Archives. It is not, therefore, about finding the correct archive story, but about how I as a scholar connect the past to my living present through making archival decisions. In those connections, I open new ideas and new possibilities for further research that are framed by personal experiences. As Antoinette Burton describes: Most [archive stories] have been framed by confessions of archival pleasure— what one historian called the [sic] “the thrill of the archival ‘pay dirt’ moment”—or, alternatively, concessions of archive aversions. For some scholars, it is memories of the labor or research that are evoked by the subject of archive stories, whether they think of such labor as trawling, reading card catalogues against the grain, or engaging in a dreaded solitary existence. Others wax rapturous about the capacity of archival discoveries to bring one into contact with the past. (8)

The archival researcher is then a story creator and story shaper, who imagines and portrays history through his or her sense of experiencing, living, and interpreting archival evidence. The created archive stories not only bring history to life, but also shape methodological understandings of how to relate the past to the present and what is important about these understandings. The third archive story also shows how narrating a story can render the archival researcher as a “historical troubleshooter,” someone who finds important and undiscovered paths in order to set the groundwork for future historians as they begin an unknown journey into historical discoveries. The archival researcher, therefore, brings aspects of histo-

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ry to life while giving the historian a sense of how this life was created. This action opens the gate for how future historians might enter and create their own historical geographies based in their own interests. Most importantly, however, my personal story must model the rigor of the search, the simple hard work and sweat needed to create these storied paths when searching and researching within the archives. Then, I, as archival researcher, must demonstrate how the emergence of the rich details from the archives can open hidden historical moments told through the voices and actions of hidden historical participants. Essentially, archive stories represent a catalyst for the writing of histories, writing that rematerializes source material in the archival context in which it is found. This methodological approach has the potential to raise the stakes of historical research by emphasizing that archival research not only frames source material into a historical narrative, but also sheds light on archival histories-in-the-making.

ARCHIVAL C OLLABORATIONS : T HE F UTURE OF H ISTORICAL W RITING Ultimately, this research reveals that archive stories have the potential to open up new possibilities of writing histories, which expand our understanding of the past and how one can connect to historical events, figures, and locations. Thus, archival story-ing constitutes an important step for the future of historical research, especially in this day and age of so much available information both in physical as well as digital archives. In fact, this ever-growing availability to research may make it necessary for archival researchers and historians to collaborate in the near future, each sharing specific talents needed to give the research depth, breadth, and currency. The archival researcher can open the gate to possibilities and the historian can open the gate to how these possibilities can connect within differing contexts. While the narratives of archival researchers can reveal the myriad paths possible to be walked

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when conducting archival research, historians can then turn these “archival walkings” into in-depth writings of histories. In summary, the narration of archival journeys draws light on potential research paths as “lived experience” in which I as an archival researcher demonstrate how source materials discovered by “dancing” back and forth within the archive can influence the course of the research journey inside and outside the actual archives. Archival storying has the potential to help historians discover and navigate through complex webs of historical information and emphasizes the “ways in which the paths they [archivists and historians] travel are marked by twists and turns, with forward steps and backward steps, with detours and side trips” (Schultz vii). As archival collections are growing, this multi-directional dance of steps will begin to further develop collaborations between archival and historical scholars. Finally, it is crucial to acknowledge archive stories not only as precursors to historical research, but also to recognize them as significant scholarly products. In Beyond the Archives, Lucille M. Schultz articulates the value of archival story-ing by claiming that, “Not only, therefore, do these writers make an archival turn with their works, they also make a writerly turn in the ways they present it to us—and readers are the richer for that” (ix). Narrating archive stories brings “voices” to light for differing scholarly conversations thereby contributing to our understanding of the past. These “voices” are not only the historical figures hidden in the archive, but also the “voices” of archival researchers who narrate the passion for archival research. In a sense then, archival story-ing contributes a methodological approach within the exploration of extant archives for researchers interested in discovering lost voices in history.

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P OST -S CRIPTUM : T HE D ANCE AFTER

THE

B ALL E NDED

The need for collaborations between archival researchers and historians became evident during the oral defense of my dissertation in June 2012 when one of my dissertation committee members, a trained historian, asked me why I had not located a picture of John “Spike” Holden as she was able to find it on Harvard University’s Visual Image Access (VIA). While my earlier search in 2011, even with the help of trained librarian, did not turn up an image of “Spike,” it appears that the archival system has been updated with new digital material. This incident demonstrates that an archive is constantly growing and evolving as archival material is added and keyword searches are refined to aid scholars in the pursuit of finding and constructing histories. It is important to reiterate that archival story-ing can only lay the groundwork for future historical research avenues by providing an overview of the range of source materials in archives and by raising stimulating questions that pique the interest of historical scholars. At the same time one must realize that an archive story represents only a snapshot of an archival journey that does not claim to provide a full history in which every archival lead or source is explored in minute detail. Indeed, it is the historical researcher who will further pursue these archival leads discovered and narrated by the archival researcher, leads that historians will follow in a rigorous fashion allowing them to construct a detailed and in-depth writing of histories. For the purposes of archival story-ing in this research, the territory was specifically limited to one physical archive, the Radcliffe College Archives, and the environment in which it was housed. The historians working with the archival research may then cast a wider net in their information search for materials that extends beyond this one archival location. Archival collaborations are therefore vital with the archival researcher and the historian applying differing sets of skills to bring history to life. Basically, the archival researcher opens areas of potential discovery for the historian to explore in depth. As an archival

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scholar, I found myself identifying with the words of Lisa Mastrangelo and Barbara L’Eplattenier in their essay, “Stumbling in the Archives” in which they reflect on the future of archival research: We have large questions to ask about doing archival work and only small answers to share. We share our stories and our experiences, hoping they draw attention to the need for greater interest in and training for archival research, but also with the hope that our enthusiasm, our love of the August mushroom hunt, will be passed on to someone else. (168)

Acknowledgements

I would like to gratefully acknowledge the many individuals who have contributed to this research project. This book would not have been possible with the generous assistance of many people. I wish to express my deepest gratitude to my dissertation committee chair Dr. Linda Caldwell for her encouragement to pursue this research topic and think critically outside the box. I am indebted for always providing both constructive comments and criticism and for always answering the numerous questions I have put to her by email. I would not have been able to complete this work without her expertise, guidance, and patience. I would also like to thank my dissertation committee member Dr. Claire Sahlin for introducing me to women’s studies and her unwavering support for the story of women in higher education, which was truly inspiring for my research. Her intellectual influence has been profound and sensitized me to engage with the history of dancing women in higher education. I also wish to express thanks to my dissertation committee member Mary Williford-Shade for her faith in my scholarly abilities. At an early stage in my graduate studies I benefited from her advice to pursue a research topic that explores dance in higher education. My research was supported by a two-year Visiting Fellowship in affiliation with the Committee on Studies of Women, Gender and Sexuality at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. Indeed, Harvard University proved to be an excellent base, and I wish

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to thank Dr. Brad Epps who has graciously supported my fellowship. I would also like to thank the librarians and archivists at the Schlesinger Library, who went beyond archival caretaking to engage me in writing archive stories that truly reflect my experience of discovering and exploring dance histories at Radcliffe College. Their tireless assistance in my search for dance stories at the Radcliffe College Archives was invaluable for my work; research under these conditions was a great joy. For permission to quote from the archival material, I would also sincerely thank the Schlesinger Library. Special thanks go to all the dancers at Harvard University: The Harvard Ballet Company and the Harvard Early Music Society for which I choreographed and performed. I also thank the faculty and staff of Harvard University’s dance program, who always encouraged me to pursue my research and inspired me with their own commitment and dedication to dance at Harvard University. I am particularly indebted to Dr. Sue Lanser for sharing her wise counsel at the Graduate Consortium for Women’s Studies’ Workshop for Dissertation Writers. For their insightful comments and suggestions, I acknowledge and thank my peers from the workshop, who carefully read parts of my work and offered ongoing advice and encouragement. Thank you to Prof. Dr. Gabriele Brandstetter and Prof. Dr. Gabriele Klein for critically reviewing my work and their support to publish this book in transcript Verlag’s Critical Dance Studies series. I have had the great pleasure to work with staff at transcript Verlag, who provided invaluable assistance in publishing this book. I particularly thank my project manager Anke Poppen, who supported me tirelessly throughout the final stages of this publication. Finally, my greatest debts are to my partner Ulrich Fischer-Hecht for his unceasing patience, generosity of spirit and support of my research through many difficult times. His enthusiasm and ongoing support for this project are invaluable as he read the manuscript countless times throughout its numerous transformations.

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