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Alvina Krause
Alvina Krause (January 28, 1893 – December 31, 1981) was an American drama teacher at Northwestern University, theatrical entrepreneur, "maker of stars", and director. Her students called her AK. Her first name is pronounced Al-vine-na.
As a girl in rural Wisconsin she found a copy of Hamlet (one source says A Doll's House), and was smitten with a love of dramatic literature, even though an older sister teased her for mispronouncing many of the words. As a high school senior, she dismissed her first marriage proposal, vowing to seek a career. After a stint at University of Wisconsin, she found her way to Evanston.
In her first year at the Cumnock school she was thrilled and intimidated when its founder (later professor at Northwestern) addressed the new class.
Krause's life partner was her former student, Lucy McCammon (August 12, 1898–December 19, 1991), born to a family prominent in Springfield, Missouri. McCammon taught physical education at Bloomsburg State College (1926-1958). From 1971, the two women shared a house in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania.
After high school, she attended the Cumnock Oratorical School, 1914–1916. After graduation, she taught elocution and girls' athletics in high schools in Colorado and Springfield, Missouri.
She returned to Northwestern, earning a bachelor's degree in 1928. She taught drama and English at a high school in Seaside, Oregon, where some of her family lived. She coached the girls' basketball team to a state championship. She taught drama for a year at Hamline University in St. Paul. Her student group from Hamline performed so well at a drama festival in Evanston, that Northwestern hired her.
In 1930, Northwestern appointed her an Instructor of Voice and Interpretation in the School of Speech. She earned a master's degree there in 1933; her master's thesis (A Study of Creative Imagination) purported to describe the creative process scientifically. Her principal duties were giving private lessons in voice and interpretation. Budget considerations led the School of Speech to discontinue private instruction in the early 1940s. She was appointed assistant professor in 1941, and developed a one-year course in acting. She expanded this to a three-year acting program, developing an approach still used at Northwestern and emulated elsewhere. In 1957 she was appointed associate professor.
Krause was the artistic director and driving force for summer theater at Eagles Mere, Pennsylvania, for twenty years from 1945 producing 178 plays by Chekhov, Ibsen, Molière, Rostand, Shakespeare, and Shaw. It drew scouts from movie studios and the professional stage. Over spring break in 1945, she and Miss McCammon (who taught physical education at nearby Bloomsburg State Teachers College) leased the Forest Inn Playhouse. (Ethel Barrymore's daughter Ethel Barrymore Colt had performed there.) Each summer, AK invited some of her Northwestern acting students to Eagles Mere. She herself acted in two productions. The students acted and produced the plays, sewed costumes, sold tickets door to door, cooked, cleaned, and controlled the bat and mouse population. They featured performers such as Patricia Neal, Jimmy Gheen, Charlton Heston, Jennifer Jones, Paula Prentiss, and Richard Benjamin. The legacy remained in a nationally recognized summer drama workshop Dewire Community Center, as of 1993.
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Alvina Krause
Alvina Krause (January 28, 1893 – December 31, 1981) was an American drama teacher at Northwestern University, theatrical entrepreneur, "maker of stars", and director. Her students called her AK. Her first name is pronounced Al-vine-na.
As a girl in rural Wisconsin she found a copy of Hamlet (one source says A Doll's House), and was smitten with a love of dramatic literature, even though an older sister teased her for mispronouncing many of the words. As a high school senior, she dismissed her first marriage proposal, vowing to seek a career. After a stint at University of Wisconsin, she found her way to Evanston.
In her first year at the Cumnock school she was thrilled and intimidated when its founder (later professor at Northwestern) addressed the new class.
Krause's life partner was her former student, Lucy McCammon (August 12, 1898–December 19, 1991), born to a family prominent in Springfield, Missouri. McCammon taught physical education at Bloomsburg State College (1926-1958). From 1971, the two women shared a house in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania.
After high school, she attended the Cumnock Oratorical School, 1914–1916. After graduation, she taught elocution and girls' athletics in high schools in Colorado and Springfield, Missouri.
She returned to Northwestern, earning a bachelor's degree in 1928. She taught drama and English at a high school in Seaside, Oregon, where some of her family lived. She coached the girls' basketball team to a state championship. She taught drama for a year at Hamline University in St. Paul. Her student group from Hamline performed so well at a drama festival in Evanston, that Northwestern hired her.
In 1930, Northwestern appointed her an Instructor of Voice and Interpretation in the School of Speech. She earned a master's degree there in 1933; her master's thesis (A Study of Creative Imagination) purported to describe the creative process scientifically. Her principal duties were giving private lessons in voice and interpretation. Budget considerations led the School of Speech to discontinue private instruction in the early 1940s. She was appointed assistant professor in 1941, and developed a one-year course in acting. She expanded this to a three-year acting program, developing an approach still used at Northwestern and emulated elsewhere. In 1957 she was appointed associate professor.
Krause was the artistic director and driving force for summer theater at Eagles Mere, Pennsylvania, for twenty years from 1945 producing 178 plays by Chekhov, Ibsen, Molière, Rostand, Shakespeare, and Shaw. It drew scouts from movie studios and the professional stage. Over spring break in 1945, she and Miss McCammon (who taught physical education at nearby Bloomsburg State Teachers College) leased the Forest Inn Playhouse. (Ethel Barrymore's daughter Ethel Barrymore Colt had performed there.) Each summer, AK invited some of her Northwestern acting students to Eagles Mere. She herself acted in two productions. The students acted and produced the plays, sewed costumes, sold tickets door to door, cooked, cleaned, and controlled the bat and mouse population. They featured performers such as Patricia Neal, Jimmy Gheen, Charlton Heston, Jennifer Jones, Paula Prentiss, and Richard Benjamin. The legacy remained in a nationally recognized summer drama workshop Dewire Community Center, as of 1993.