Edna L. McRae

Who is Edna L. McRae?

Edna L. McRae was an American dancer.

She began dancing and teaching dance while still a student at Schurz High School in Chicago, continuing on after graduation to dance with the Pavley-Oukrainsky Ballet and Adolph Bolm's Ballet Intime. She studied professionally with Adolph Bolm in Chicago, Nicolas Legat, Tamara Karsavina and Phyllis Bedells in London, and Mathilde Kschessinskaya, Olga Preobrajenskaya and Vera Trefilova in Paris, while teaching at Francis Parker School, Chicago Teachers College, the Adolph Bolm School of the Dance, the Pavley and Oukrainky Ballet School in Chicago, and the Perry-Mansfield Camp in Colorado.

McRae opened her own school of dance in Chicago in 1925. Here she developed many dancers who went on to professional and teaching careers. At the same time she choreographed for the "Enchanted Island" Children's Theatre at the Century of Progress Exposition, 1933/34, Chicago Park District opera groups, the Chicago Concert and Opera Guild, The Society of Polish Artists, Germania Theatre, Sidney J. Page Productions, and the initial season of The Chicago Lyric Opera.