SAN MARINO : Library Gets Items of Black Ballet Company
A pioneer in African American classic ballet has given the Huntington Library a 270-item collection chronicling the 10-year history of the country’s first minority ballet company.
Joseph Rickard, a white choreographer who recently died at the age of 75, founded the “First Negro Classic Ballet” in 1947 after being outraged at the rejection of a young African American girl from a Los Angeles ballet class.
The collection from the company that predated the Dance Theatre of Harlem by more than 20 years includes scrapbooks, photographs and music scores.
The company, whose members held full-time jobs as well, disbanded in 1957. The Huntington plans to mount an exhibit once the materials from Rickard are catalogued.
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