Eurythmy Spring Valley Celebrates Forty Years!

by Maria Ver Eecke

As Threefold marked its 90th, the School of Eurythmy Spring Valley celebrated its 40th anniversary. Graduations at ESV are always grand events and friends come from afar, creating a mood of homecoming. After a two-hour performance in the Threefold Auditorium and a reception in the Threefold Café, at the stroke of midnight comes a skit where the teachers are roasted in good natured humor and the audiencerealizes just how well these students know each other, as the graduates are portrayed by their classmates.

This special year honored the original alumni, the “A” Class of 1976 (pictured above, right). We gathered for tea in their first classroom, the home of Lisa Monges. Faculty and staff of Eurythmy Spring Valley and Threefold were the hosts. The alumni who attended were Kristin Hawkins, Alys Morgan, Grace Ann Peysson, and Carol Ann Williamson. Nancy McMahon and Francesca Margulies were unable to attend. Siegfried Finser stood in for his late wife Ruth. We were served scones with clotted cream, strawberries, and herb tea fresh from the garden.

After introductions, personal stories were told, giving space to our elders, who paved the way for all of us. I was moved by the way the younger eurythmists listened.

The School was the initiative of Kristin Hawkins, who asked Lisa Monges if she would begin a eurythmy training, as Lisa had the recognition from the Goetheanum Council to grant eurythmy diplomas. Lisa responded that such a training was best as a group process, and soon others joined the class. Kristin, a Waldorf alumna, had been doing eurythmy since she was ten years old.

Dorothea Mier

Annelies Davidson

Elsa Macauley

Now, with a family of five, she was unable to attend the eurythmy trainings in Europe. For many years, Kristin taught, performed with stage groups, and gave therapeutic eurythmy lessons at the Fellowship Community, Green Meadow Waldorf School, and the Rudolf Steiner School in NYC.

L-R, back row: Kari van Oordt, Lucille Clem, Virginia Brett, Lisa Monges, Marianne Schneider, Norman Vogel, Maidlin Vogel, Margarete Proskauer-Unger (teachers); front row: Carol Ann Williamson, Grace Ann Peysson, Alys Morgan, Nancy McMahon, Francesca Margulies, Kristin Hawkins, Ruth Finser (Class “A”)

Grace Ann Peysson remembered coming from Emerson College in 1965 to be the cook at the Threefold Farm. Many anthroposophical conferences took place during the summers. She spoke of the youth movement that met here in 1970. Grace Ann is presently living and working at Camphill Village Kimberton Hills, Pennsylvania.

Ruth Finser gave therapy sessions to children from the Hawthorne Valley and Great Barrington Rudolf Steiner schools, as well as having a private practice within her home. Nancy McMahon gave therapeutic eurythmy sessions at Raphael House and the Sacramento Waldorf School, as well as teaching a few groups of hygienic eurythmy at the Rudolf Steiner College. Francesca Margulies performed and taught eurythmy at Pinehill, Monadnock, and Great Barrington Waldorf schools. Alys Morgan was a founder of the Mountain Laurel Waldorf School in New Paltz, NY, where she continues to teach eurythmy in kindergarten through eighth grade. Carol Ann Williamson is a therapeutic eurythmist, presently working at the Otto Specht School in the Threefold Community. (Six of the seven eurythmists of Class “A” became eurythmy therapists!) Siegfried Finser was recognized as the administrator who also developed a toymaking workshop for students in a work-study program.

Looking back, one felt that the weavings of destiny were at work: that the question was asked and the teachers and students came together to found the School of Eurythmy on this continent. At the beginning of the graduation performance that evening, Barbara Schneider-Serio invited the alumni onto the presidium to recognize them publicly. An honorary diploma was given to each one.

Congratulations to the alumni and the faculty of Eurythmy Spring Valley! May this good work continue to grow and flourish.

Maria Ver Eecke (editor@eana.org) is Editor of the Newsletters of the Eurythmy Association of North America (EANA) and the Association of Therapeutic Eurythmists in North America (ATHENA).

Barbara Schneider-Serio, Beth Dunn-Fox, Sea-Anna Vasilas, Jana Hawley, Rafael Manaças

LECTURE–DEMONSTRATION PROJECTS FROM THE “A” CLASS

Language & Human Development & Its Renewal through Eurythmy — Ruth E. M. Finser

Consciousness in Movement — Francesca Margulies

How Anthroposophy Reveals Itself in Tone Eurythmy through the Classic & Romantic Periods — Alys Samuels-Morgan

Space, Form, & Color in Eurythmy — Grace Ann Peysson

The Expression of the Inaudible in Tone Eurythmy — Nancy McMahon

The Romantic Impulse in Literature as Revealed through Shelley’s Work and the Expression of Thinking, Feeling, & Will through Eurythmy — Carol Ann Williamson

Approaches to Public Classes in Eurythmy — Kristin Hawkins