Dance Recital Roster

There was more to the "Spotlight On Youth" program. Here are the other three pages. If you click on each thumbnail, it should be larger and therefore, more readable. Just in case, I decided to list the names of all of the people who were in this particular recital. Are you one of them? Do you know any of the folks listed?? If so, let me know!

Angela Holomes
Angela Lomont
Ann Menefee
Barbara Dixon
Bettina Beard
Bonnie Bectol
Bonnie Sherbon
Chris White
Connie Mitchell
Dawn Carboni
Dawn Rhoads
Debbie Lenniger
Dede Pittinger
Georgeanna Stuck
Heidi Lawrence
Heidi Schmitt
Jackie Snyder
Jane Prichard
Jill Ann Shaw
Jo Lynn Shaw
Julie Hacka
Karen Summers
Kathy Dixon
Kathy Johnson
Kelly Smith
Kim Booker
Kim Elam
Kim Gottfried
Kim Shroyer
Kim Underwood
Kim Vodde
Kristina Frazier
Leslie Cook
Lisa Booker
Lisa Carr
Lisa Knight
Lisa Russell
Lori Young
Machell Crist
Marsha Eckert
Maureen Moran
Meg Gottfried
Micca O'Connor
Michelle Cook
Michelle Wiedmann
Mike Burry
Mindi Salyer
Monica Quinn
Nancy Leullen
Patty Olson
Reed Oscott
Robert Oscott
Ronda Johnson
Rose Salyer
Sally Vodde
Sandy Pressler
Sheri Crist
Sheri Knight
Susan Gardner
Susan Huntley
Susan Mitchell
Tammy Browne
Tammy Perkins
Teresa Mitchell
Tina Le Compete
Toni Eckert
Tracie Pattee
Tracie Stabler
Tricia Elam
Tricia Zuber
Vicki Olson
Vicki Smith

Spotlight On Youth

On May 17, 1973 (my parent's 7th wedding anniversary), I performed for my very first time in front of an audience in a dance recital held at South Side High School.

I don't remember being nervous. I do remember loving all of the fun costumes that I got to wear. The stage seemed enormous - I've never been back to South Side since so I don't know if I was comparing it to the stage at Indian Village Elementary (and that was small in comparison) or if South Side's was really humungous!

That's me - girl on the end (all the way to the far right). You'll notice that what I'm doing seems to be just a tad bit different from the other two girls. My grandma swears up and down (even to this day) that I was doing the routine perfectly and the other two girls were missing their moves. Dontcha just love grandma's?!

In this picture, I am almost in the middle (count four over from the right). I seem to be doing pretty much was everyone else is but NOTICE the swinging arms and the amount of space between me and each girl beside me :). Is it my imagination OR are those other girls lookin' at me?! Was I doing something special or were they watching a freak show in motion? I guess we will never know....

I am not in this picture.

Nor in this one.

But you see, these four pictures, along with the program, are the only physical/tangible things I have left from my Marlene's Dance Studio days.

My red hair bow, my red tutu, and the red/white striped outfit, and my tap shoes you see in the first and second picture - I packed those very carefully into a box that I kept with me at almost all times. When we had to pick up and move to yet another house or another school in the later years, it was part of the stuff that I kept close to me - like my identity box.

Whenever I felt lost or insignificant or sad - I would look at the stuff in my box and be reminded that I was someone who mattered and despite what was going on around me, everything would get better. That was the hope that I needed to hold on to in order to get through that day or night or week or month.

When I was 17, my box disappeared forever and as silly as it may sound, it's something that still makes me sad. It's just "stuff" - I know...the symbolism of its existence though - reinforced so many things for me and without it, well...I'm not even sure what to say. It may be the reason why I started this blog about a year ago. Maybe this is my new identity box...

Marlene's Dance Studio

Marlene's Dance Studio
Originally uploaded by kristinafh

There were many reasons why I loved living and growing up on the south side of Fort Wayne.

Things were not so (I'm looking for the right word)...'corporate' and 'big'.

There were many small business owners not only for retail but also for services. I don't know if my parents consciously patronized small business owners, but it seemed like we did a lot of that thing back in my childhood.

One of my stories from last month (http://childofthefort.blogspot.com/2008/10/imagination-can-alter-life.html) explained how me, my sister, and my friend Erika, became interested in stuff like tap and gymnastics.

And sometime in 1972, we began lessons over at Marlene's Dance Studio.

Who was Marlene?

I didn't really know back then. When I started to look into writing this blog entry, I became curious and I looked through a lot of stuff, trying to piece things together.

Unfortunately, it was her obituary that gave me the most background information about her. Marlene Huntley died in March 2002 at the age of 63. She was originally from Bay City, Michigan and had worked at Hall's on Bluffton Road as a waitress for several years.

I don't know if she had a professional dance background or how she decided to open up her own dance studio. I also don't know when her studio shut down or how her life played out (with the exception of what the obituary told me). I guess yet another mystery that will go unanswered...

Marlene's dance studio was located - get this - on West Dewald Street.

West Dewald is perhaps - not the hot, happenin' area that it once was, but back then, the neighborhood was clean, safe, and full of kids who rode their bikes and played kickball and dodgeball in the street. I haven't been back in that area for over 30 years - I wonder what it's like today???

Marlene didn't have a fancy dance studio. Nope. She used her house for lessons. It looked like the area that would have been her living room was completely ripped up/redone to look like a dance studio. There were hardwood floors, a mirror that stretched from ceiling to floor and covered an entire wall. There was one of those ballet bars fastened to the wall where the mirror was. She had tons of vinyl and one giant/loud record player that was quite awesome to six/seven year olds...

Note: Thanks to Scott Howard for locating Marlene's house on google street maps....it barely resembles the place I used to visit 2 times a week.



My mother signed me and Patty up for tap and acrobatics (aka gymnastics). Tap was my thing. Gymnastics - not so much. I think it was because I was tall and lanky and not very bendy :).

After school, my mom used to make the three of us (me, Patty, Erika), practices our new hobby on our enclosed front porch. During the winter time, it was really cold so we would start out with our winter coats on.

I think if anyone would have seen Erika doing a back bend with her big old parka coat on, they would have had a giggle. She was challenged with the hood (always) and we had quite a debate on whether the hood (with the furry stuff on the outside of it) should be up or down. Down guaranteed major repercussions including accidentally smacking yourself in the head (with the hood) on the way back up from the back bend or with it up, you risked major static cling (thanks to the Indiana winters - dry dry dry climate).

I guess if my parents would have just heated the area - this would have taken away the whole parka dilemma :).

We knew that when it was time for Gilligan's Island, we were done practicing on the front porch and we could come in to watch Marianne, Ginger, and the Professor.

Imagination Can Alter A Life

My sister Patty, me, and Ericka, used to spend a lot of time outdoors goofing off. When we were together (and maybe with other kids in the neighborhood) we would play the usual games of tag, red rover, ghost in the grave yard, and hide-n-go-seek.

But sometimes, there were no other kids to play with and when left to our own devices, we always managed to figure something out. In other words - boredom wasn't even in our vocabulary.



For example, while waiting for Selsa to drop off Ericka at my house one day, I stood outside and walked the curb of our street. I practiced putting one foot in front of another - like I was a gymnast walking on a balance beam. I'm sure that I had seen something like this on ABC Wide World of Sports - my whole goal at that time though - was to just pass time until Ericka got to my house.

Over time, using the curb as our balance beam became one of our games. We would judge each other - pretend that we were losing our balance - pretend that we were the most graceful girls that ever were. Sometimes, we danced on our balance beam.

I have no clue how it happened, but the next thing I knew, my mom and Selsa, had signed me, Ericka, and Patty up for classes with Marlene's Dance Studio.

We were enrolled in gymnastics and tap. While Patty and Ericka were much better at the gymnastics part, I was a total genius in the tap area.

Gymnastics significantly altered both Patty and Ericka's life. They both went on and excelled in gymnastics, receiving huge accolades in the form of awards and state recognitions.

And it all started - on the curb of Cedar Crest Circle. Who would have thought?!