01 January 1953
Early in her career, Williams found few professional performance options in Boston. Most opportunities were limited to vaudeville or burlesque, neither of which was an option for her. She chose instead to focus on teaching and training young dancers, opening her first studio in Malden in the 1930s. By the early 1950s she opened a studio in Boston on Huntington Avenue in the Back Bay next to New England Conservatory.
Her teaching inspired decades of promising dancers, many of whom would go on to have illustrious careers in dance. Students like Eleanor D'Antuono (Ballet Russe, American Ballet Theatre), Sara Leland, Earle Sieveling, and Robert Rodham (New York City Ballet), and James Capp (The National Ballet, Washington) often returned as guests artists for the New England Civic Ballet, and later the Boston Ballet. Many of her early students remained in Boston as founding members of Boston Ballet.
Sydney Leonard and E. Virginia Williams, circa 1957
Unsigned photograph
Boston Ballet Archive