By the time the Ginner-Mawer School reached 21 years of existence, Stanley Baldwin had been British Prime Minister three times. Irene Mawer quoted Earl Baldwin, who I presume is the same person. I have tried to find where the quotation was used by Baldwin, but have failed, however, I can
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Mr and Mrs John Laurie. It pains me to refer to a woman only by her husband’s name, as in ‘Mrs John Laurie’. However, this is how women were normally referred to in England in the past, indeed, the not so distant past at that. In this blog post we
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Avice Spitta Landone (1910-1976) During the party to celebrate the 21st birthday of the Ginner-Mawer School in 1934, Irene Mawer mentioned several former students who had gone on to do well for themselves. Among them was Avice Spitta, later known as Avice Landone. I got very excited because I discovered
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In 1954, while Ruby Ginner was heading for retirement and the Ginner-Mawer School of Dance and Drama was being wound up, Irene Mawer continued to teach in Cheltenham for three days a week (Cheltenham Chronicle, 2nd Oct 1954). I don’t know where the classes were held, but throughout her life,
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Miss Melusine Wood In 1933 and 1934 we hear about a woman called Miss Melusine Wood. Melusine is not a name I have come across before and according to Wikipedia it is a French word from European folklore, meaning ‘a female spirit of fresh water in a holy well or
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From an article in The Link, July 1934, p.6, we learn that there was to be a Summer School of the Central School of Speech Training at the Royal Albert Hall. It was to be attended by delegates of the Drama League. The inaugral lecture-demonstration in Mime was to be
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Italian Marionettes The Link, July 1934, p.247 From time to time, Irene Mawer’s husband, Mark Edward Perugini, was editor of The Link, which was ‘The Journal of the Association of Teachers of the Revived Greek Dance; the Z Club; the Ginner-Mawer School; and of all who are interested
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From The Link, July 1934, p.6 The Link was the newsletter associated with the Association of the Teachers of the Revived Greek Dance, and the Ginner-Mawer School of Speech and Dramatic Art. Although the Institute of Mime was not mentioned on the front cover in the same way that the
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Central School in 1930s. Irene Mawer trained under Elsie Fogerty at the Central School of Speech and Drama in 1914/15/16. Mawer had done some training and had taken paid employment before enrolling at Central, so she was already 21 years of age when she started there. Fogie discovered that Mawer
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