Grandmothers in Dance

If you're from Cedar Rapids, my current hometown, you probably know these two women.  They are Julia Bennett (left) and Edna Dieman (right), the founders of a long-running dance studio here in Cedar Rapids.

Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett are my grandmothers in dance.

I don't know if "grandmothers in dance" is actually a thing, but it means this: they were the teachers of my ballet teacher, Suki Morrisey. (Yes, at age 52, I take ballet classes, twice a week, with other ladies . . . of a certain age. I am grateful for the opportunity.)

Suki, who was the Sugar Plum Fairy for many Nutcracker performances of the Dieman-Bennett Dance studio, sprinkles our "Adult Intermediate" ballet classes with anecdotes about Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett, who were apparently formidable teachers--full of passion and high expectations for all their many, many students (they taught here for 40 years). I love hearing these stories.

We often heard about "Miss Bennett's notebooks," which were, according to Suki, a set of large blue three-ring binders that Miss Bennett had filled with typewritten stories and remembrances of her life: her memoir. Suki hoped that the stories in those notebooks would live on, somehow, after Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett had passed away.

At some point, it dawned on me. I am a writer: maybe I can help share the story of my dance grandmothers . . .

I talked my ideas over with a friend, choreographer and dance instructor Carol Maxwell-Rezabek--could we somehow bring Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett's words, ideas, and dances to life for a contemporary audience?  We decided to try.

This summer, we began our work, learning about Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett by going through their papers, memoirs, diaries, VHS tapes, newspaper clippings, photographs, and Miss Bennett's Notebooks--housed at the Iowa Women's Archives. You can't imagine how delightful this work was. Or maybe you can.

This fall, I hope to interview with people who knew Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett--former students, collaborators, people involved in the arts in Cedar Rapids--to get more perspective on their work.

Our goal? Carol and I hope to create a multi-media presentation that shares images, words, music, and dance by and about Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett.

I'm not sure how long it will take us to create this presentation. In the meantime, I thought I'd share some images I've discovered and reflections on what I'm learning about Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett.

One of the images I discovered was this one. Don't they look elegant?  they look like they are wearing some kind of ethnic clothing--kimonos or, more likely, something from India.

The photo appeared in the Gazette, the local paper in Cedar Rapids, in March of 1951, just before Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett performed for the first time in Cedar Rapids as guest artists of the Beethoven Club.  They called the program their "triumvirate performance," as it blended 1. singing, 2. dancing, and 3. piano music.  Miss Bennett sang--songs from Schumann's Dichterliebe Song Cycle--Miss Dieman danced (while Miss Bennett sang Schumann, and to music of India and Spain) and Alma Turachek, professor of music at Coe College played piano.

The article notes that this was not the first performance. The program's debuted January 7, 1951--in New York City.

Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett met in New York City in 1945. Miss Dieman was there studying ethnic dance and working for the Center for Ethnologic Dance. Miss Bennett had just arrived from India, where she had grown up and where her British parents still lived, hoping to make a start as a professional singer. Apparently Miss Bennett had very little money, but she did have authentic Indian saris, which Miss Dieman bought.

"It was there, at the ethnological Dance Center, that I met Edna Dieman, Director of the Center," writes Miss Bennett in her Notebooks. "It was her birthday and I remember it well.  Her eyes were like stars and looked through me like laser beams.  It was a meeting that would change my life."

Miss Bennett's notebooks are deliciously dramatic.

This photo is a visual record of the importance of that meeting. In 1950, the two women came to Cedar Rapids--Miss Dieman's hometown--to teach a summer dance class. They ended up moving here. They started their dance studio in a small room at the YWCA, teaching ballet.

They were always multi-faceted artists. They didn't just teach ballet--they taught Spanish dance, Hindu dance, and Baroque dance, too.  There were yoga classes, and classes for adult students, like the one I'm taking now. Miss Bennett continued performing as a singer, and the Dieman-Bennett Dance Studio was known for its extensive collaborations with other arts organizations in town.

This is just the first photo that documents their impact on Cedar Rapids.  It's a hint of things to come.

As Gazette Arts writer Dee Ann Rexroat wrote in 1990, "Miss Dieman and Miss Bennett.  The names are synonymous with dance and the arts in Cedar Rapids."

Over the next week or so, before things get too busy at Coe, I'll use this blog to share a few more of what I've discovered about my influential grandmothers in dance.