Best of The Westchester Historian

Best of
The Westchester Historian

The Isadora Duncan Influence in Westchester
by Jane Northshield

Isadora Duncan could mesmerize the most sophisticated theater-going audiences in the world. She was the darling of high society, and the leading artists of the early twentieth century had portfolios of sketches and photographs, their efforts to capture the essence of this new dancing genius. Every detail of her private life was made public fodder throughout Europe and America.

Isadora had reached the peak of her career when war began in Europe in 1914, and, with other Americans, she was urged to return to the United States. Before she left Paris the children were brought over. The children were 15 young German girls from the school she and her sister had established in Germany. The people in Westchester who had known and admired Isadora in Europe took in the children and helped to reestablish the school. They were not ordinary children arriving on ordinary doorsteps.

There was never anything ordinary about Isadora. She was born in 1878 (new evidence now says 1877) in San Francisco, fourth in a family of four. Her father soon left the family, and her mother gave music lessons to support her two girls and two boys. They grew closer than most families, held together by their poverty, their love of music and dance and theater, and their ambition. Isadora and her sister, Elizabeth, taught themselves to dance and began teaching others… Continue

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