Putnam patriot., 1915-10-01
DANCING GIRLS
Leave Their Woodland Hannts for the
Metropolis
Have Entertained the Countryside About
Old Woodstock

Specials from South Woodstock to
New York and Boston papers relative
TO the students at the Noyes school of
aesthetic dancing appeared Monday
and were read with interest in this
section. The following is from an H.
Illustrated story in one New York pa
per;
Mrs. Florence Fleming Noyes, in d.
structor in poise and "lyro. rhythmic
expression, +" is transferring TO No. 30
Madison avenue for the winter a
school which in the summer she has
been conducting at South Woodstock,
Conn, and is bringing her pupils with
her.
No. go Madison avenue is the old
home of Robert Ingersoll, and is di.
reetly across the street from the house
of J. Pierpont Morgan. The forty
beautiful girls will dwell there as well
rs study there.
And they will wear-though not in
the open air rs they did at South
Aoodstoek-iilmy costumes of chiffon
There will be neither sutficiency nor
weight of fabric to cucumber them
in their lissome movements.
just how South Woodstock, which
has had the yorng pupils of Mrs.
Noyes all summer, feels about their
departure is difficult to ascertain. But
it is probably mixed ceiling, with
the feminine part of the countryside
heaving sighs CT relief, and the mascu-
line end closing its eyes and trying to
call back the wonderful visions 1t be-
held through the warm, sunlit days.
AT least that is the occasional feeling
of reporter who saw the dances of
the sprites.
AT the beginning of July Mrs. Noyes
rented the 200. acre farm of Judge AL
fred Matthewson of New Haven, a
beautiful place which contains velvety
lawns, ripping brooks, secluded wood.
land glades and all the other things
necessary to call to the mind of a
young woman what might be termed
"thoughts beautiful Mrs. Moves is
the dancer who impersoneted "Liber-
tyr on the Capitol steps at the inaugu-
ration of President Wilson. She has
appeared at various pageants given by
sufiragists. Rodin, the sculptor, said
she had the most perfect right arm in
the world, her friends say.
To the remote Connecticut farm
came her pupils from New York, Bos-
ton, Philadelphia, Chicago, Cleveland,
and half a dozen other cities. They
were to learn grace, poise, and "lyro-
rhythmic expression Some of them
brought ten or twelve trunks of cloth
ing with them, but as soon as they ar
rived they learned that the impera-
tive order of Mrs. Noyes was that the
girls were to wear loose robes of the
lightest of chiffon; only that and MOTH
ing more. No shoes, no corsets, abso-
lutely nothing but the chiffon.
Al first the dancing lessons were
given on a smooth stretch of turf not
far from the road which leads to Pom
fret, where the Woodstock Valley far
mers go to send their produce to mar
ket But it was not long before Mrs.
Noyes found that farmers wagons and
automobiles were blocking the road
way, and that every dance was beheld
by an assemblage of spectators, rang
ing from millionsires to hired men. So
she had her own hired man, Gus En-
ickson, cut 800 white birch saplings
and make a stockade of them, which
shut off the view.
But enthusiastic spectators pried
and cut apart the birches, and throng-
ed the roadside in greater numbers
than ever. And so--alas for the gen.
eral populace-Mrs. Noyes changed
the scene OF the terpsichorean endeav-
ors TO secluded glade away back in
the woods, far from any road.
Every morning and afternoon the
girls danced and sought to give rhyth-
mic expression to their thoughts. Each
was told, upon her arrival, that she
must forget her family and name, and
assume the character of some mytho-
logical person.