Aurora Borealis Greely (1905 – 1983) was an

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

dancer Dance is a performing art form consisting of sequences of movement, either improvised or purposefully selected. This movement has aesthetic and often symbolic value. Dance can be categorized and described by its choreography, by its repertoi ...

and

choreographer Choreography is the art or practice of designing sequences of movements of physical bodies (or their depictions) in which motion or form or both are specified. ''Choreography'' may also refer to the design itself. A choreographer is one who cr ...

from the 1920s through the 1940s.

Biography

Greely was born in Jacksonville, Florida in 1905. In 1922 she was a student at

Wadleigh High School for Girls The Wadleigh High School for Girls, which was established by the NYC Board of Education in 1897, and which moved into its new building in Harlem in September 1902, was the first public high school for girls in New York City. At the time, public ...

and was performing in Irvin C. Miller's play "Liza" which was on Broadway. She started in the chorus, and then moved into leading roles. In 1929 she opened a dancing school in Los Angeles, and in 1932, she took a break from dancing because she suffered from "rheumatic leg". Greely returned to dancing an in 1935 she was described as a "popular dance team" when she danced with Leroy Broomfield. In 1933, she and Broomfield danced before King

Gustaf V Gustaf V (Oscar Gustaf Adolf; 16 June 1858 – 29 October 1950) was King of Sweden from 8 December 1907 until his death in 1950. He was the eldest son of King Oscar II of Sweden and Sophia of Nassau, a half-sister of Adolphe, Grand Duke of Luxem ...

of Sweden while in Shanghai. At the Cotton Club in

Culver City, California Culver City is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 40,779. Founded in 1917 as a "whites only" sundown town, it is now an ethnically diverse city with what was called the "third-most d ...

, Greely selected the dancers from her dancing school for the shows, and was herself dancing in shows.

References

1905 births Date of birth missing 1983 deaths Date of death missing American choreographers {{dance-bio-stub