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 The
60-Years-and-Up Club
By Anne L. Silveri
Marjorie Sellers: 74 years and counting
This is the first article in a three-part series that
celebrates a unique breed of dance teacher: those who have had
the dedication, determination, and stamina—and most of all,
love for their art form and their students—to teach dance for
60 years or more.
It all started with a pair of pointe shoes. Marjorie
Holzschuher Sellers became enchanted by dance at a young age,
when two of her friends starting taking dance classes. She put
on a pair of their pointe shoes and her life was instantly
changed. “Somehow, never having seen them before, I put them
on and stood just fine,” says Sellers, attributing her natural
facility to the fact that “when I was younger all children
wore hightop shoes that gave their feet and ankles good
support.” Her friends taught her their recital routines and
she was hooked for life.
Sellers has been teaching at her homey studio, Holzschuher
Dance Arts, in Zanesville, a small Ohio town east of Columbus,
since 1933. She still comes to her three-classroom studio to
teach three days a week. “I never thought about getting old,”
says the spry 89-year-old. “I was doing great until I took a
fall three years ago.” Arching in ballet class gives her some
trouble, though she can still bend forward easily. She remains
as dedicated as ever to dance education.
Getting Started
Sellers fondly remembers her beginnings as a dancer and
teacher. Excited by what she was
learning from the girls next door, she thought it was
high time to start taking dance classes at age 6. She studied
tap and ballet at Georgia McLaughlin School of Dance, where
she stayed for 10 years, assisting with classes in 9th and
10th grade. Although Sellers later learned that McLaughlin did
not have much dance training herself, the teacher was like
family to her. “I never had sisters or brothers so I felt very
close to her,” says Sellers. “When I was invited
to a school dance she loaned me her red taffeta formal to
wear.”
Sellers had not planned to become a dance teacher, instead
setting her sights on teaching math. But at age 16 she reached
a turning point in her life. McLaughlin died of cancer at 29
and Sellers took over the studio. Running a studio as a teen
presented some difficulties, since she was younger than some
of her students. She
tried to keep a positive attitude and offer criticism to the
group as a whole, but being so young and having so much
responsibility was tricky. One day she eagerly jotted down all
the dance routines in a movie musical to gather material for
teaching, some of which she still uses today in her preschool
classes.
During her last two years of high school Sellers discovered
that “dancing won out”—she liked teaching dance better than
math. But she knew she had to learn more to become an
effective teacher. “I knew I had to go to New York. I learned
that I did not know proper ballet terminology at all.” While
still in high school she took a teaching course taught by Ned
Wayburn, a Ziegfeld Follies director/
producer/choreographer in New York, and returned several times
to continue her studies. Because Sellers had never left Ohio,
her mother accompanied her to New York in the summer of 1934.
“Mother and I walked from the YMCA on 38th to the studio on
58th to save bus fare to help pay for meals. We took a
different route every day; that’s how I know New York as well
as I do today,” she says. “I loved every minute of it.”
The young school owner returned from New York a more confident
teacher. She took her job seriously and knew all the best
teachers in New York City. Jack Stanly was one of her
favorites. When he asked her to demonstrate at the Dance
Masters of America (DMA) nationals she jumped at the
opportunity. “I was nervous at first,” she says. “But I had
learned all the routines during the summers.” She ended up
being Stanly’s demonstrator at DMA and Dance Educators of
American (DEA) for 25 years and enjoyed it thoroughly.
Sellers’ many teachers included Igor Youskevitch, Ernest
Carlos, Charles Kelley, Joseph Levinoff, Johnny Mattison, Ron
Ferella, Jack Potteiger, Jay Dash, and Brenda Bufalino.
Sellers recalls a funny experience dancing with a fellow
Stanly student, Timmy Everett, whom she describes as “a
wonderful all-round dancer who turned like a top.” Together
they performed to “Steam Heat” at the Chicago National
Association of Dance Masters (CNADM) convention banquet. “We
were on our knees a lot and mine got so sore. My costume had
blue slacks and a checked redand- white top, and I found that
the slacks had pockets on each knee. I got two small
potholders and sewed them into place so I could get on my
knees and not hurt so badly.”
At 28, Sellers married “the most wonderful guy on Earth,”
Roland Sellers, a musician and World War II pilot. He passed
away in 1995. The couple had no children, Sellers says,
because “we had everybody else’s children.”
Fast Forward to Today
Sellers’ contribution to the field has not gone unnoticed; she
is now a life member of DEA and CNADM and a 50- year member of
DMA. Her only regret is that she never danced professionally.
She advises young teachers to study someplace else other than
their ho metowns
and to get professional experience. “Don’t start a studio
until you have a set of credentials,” she cautions them.
Sellers has seen many changes in her students over the years,
most notably the permissiveness of the “all about me”
generation. She believes that a lack of discipline at home
translates into poor behavior in the dance studio and that
children who are rarely told no at home often have control
problems in class. Most parents are not very discriminating
about the quality of instruction their kids receive, she says.
“Dancing is supposed to be fun and games these days—you know,
a little something to do. Dance is fun after you learn to do
it correctly.” In Sellers’ experience, students whose mothers
have taken lessons from her tend to be better behaved than
their classmates. Currently she has one fourth-generation
student, whose mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother all
took class with her.
This veteran teacher is a stickler about the value of ballet
training as a foundation for all dance. “When I first started
it was hard to get people to take ballet,” she says. “I think
even a tap routine should show that the person has studied
ballet. Girls should look lovely when they tap.” She’s not so
happy with the current state of dance. “Hiphop is overdone. I
like everything to be pretty,” she says. “I don’t like it when
they wiggle themselves to death and don’t really dance.” She
thinks that footwork is lacking and movements are too
suggestive in today’s choreography. She misses the days of
Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, when movie musicals were wildly
popular. “We just don’t have dancers like that anymore.”
Sellers’ Legacy
For almost 30 years Sellers’ students were featured on a local
television show, produced by Sellers, called the
Holzschuher Dance Studio Revue. Airing on a local
affiliate of NBC from 1957 to 1987, the studio’s dancers
performed in half-hour shows every two weeks from October to
April, plus a one-hour Christmas special shown during prime
time. Sellers stopped producing the show when production costs
became prohibitive.
Sellers says that many of her students tell her they are in
debt to her; it’s not unusual for them to claim that they
would not be who they are today if it had not been for her.
She provided a compassionate ear for her students, saying that
she could always tell when their lives were disrupted by
personal problems—it showed in their dancing. She
 led
by example; she never smoked or drank and she instilled a
lifelong love for dance in her students. “My students say they
look at things differently because of having danced,” she
says.
One of Sellers’ former students, Butch Theisen, 54, is ready
to continue his teacher’s legacy. He began studying with her
at age 3, and apart from a two-year break for college, has
been affiliated with the studio ever since. “Butch is my best
friend,” Sellers says. “He’s family.”
Theisen remembers taking tap classes with her as a child. He
and his brother would show up every Saturday morning. His
brother had some trouble, but she never criticized him and
always maintained an upbeat attitude. “Now we need to keep
working on that,” she would tell them both. Theisen attributes
Sellers’ longevity in the teaching business to the fact that
“she can explain everything to the nth degree and never
get tired of doing so.”
These days Theisen teaches most of the studio’s classes and
plans to take over when Sellers retires. The name of the
school will remain unchanged, however. “It was her blood,
sweat, and tears, tremendous hours of dedication to the art,
the thousands of hours spent in continuing education that
built the studio in the first place,” he says. “I want it to
continue in her memory when that day comes.”
Recital Magic
The annual recital is always an exciting time for Sellers and
Theisen, and both eagerly anticipate her 75th, in 2008. They
blew out all the stops for the 70th “Royal” anniversary
recital in 2003. Theisen decorated the theater with old
costumes and photos dating back to 1933. An unforgettable
surprise finale, “Marjorie Sellers, This Is Your Life,” closed
the show with alumnae coming onstage to send their best wishes
to her. A smashing, Rockettes-style number with 24 girls in a
kick line followed, and then the back curtain opened to reveal
a catered buffet for all to enjoy. Sellers was so delighted
with the program—“I was on cloud nine”—that she doesn’t know
how they will able to top it in 2008. But she fully expects to
be around to see just what magic they’ll concoct.
Photo captions (from top to bottom):
Marjorie Sellers and dance partner Stan Mazin jazzing it up at
Jack Stanly’s New York City studio.
Marjorie Sellers in her early teens. A few years later the
precocious entrepreneur would be running a dance school. Photo
by Ideal Art.
Sellers (center) with one of her former teachers, Bob Audy,
and Noreen Rhode, Dance Masters of Ohio secretary and DMA Area
II vice president.
A young Butch Theisen with his teacher and mentor, Marjorie
Sellers. Photo by Ted Wright Studio.
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