Frye at an Undergrad Mixer

dance30s

A note from Bob Denham:

For your edification, here’s the last paragraph in a letter from [class of ’33 member] Pete Colgrove, now 85, living in Santa Fe, NM:

I could mention an instance of Norrie’s sense of humor. With immense dry relish he would tell the story of the first dance he went to after trying to absorb all my anxiously persistent coaching, a tea-dance at one of the girls’ residences, called a ‘Paul Jones’: a circle of boys facing in around a circle of girls facing out; when the march music stops without warning, the couples facing pair off to dance; this happens several times and so becomes a ‘mixer.’ Norrie, who was of average height, had to dance in succession with the three tallest girls in our year—each well over six feet tall! Well, Norrie would wind up this story magnificently describing how he couldn’t see where he was leading, and worse, could see neither to the left nor right since his nose was buried between the bosoms of his partners.’ (Pete had learned ballroom dancing from his two female cousins.)

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