Lois Blake
{{short description|British dance scholar}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Lois Blake
| image =
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| birth_name = Lois Agnes Fownes Turner
| birth_date = 21 May 1890
| birth_place = Streatham, London, U.K.
| death_date = 19 November 1974 (age 84)
| death_place = Marshfield, U.K.
| other_names =
| occupation = Folklorist, dance scholar
| years_active =
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| notable_works =
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}}
Lois Blake (21 May 1890 – 19 November 1974), born Lois Agnes Fownes Turner, was a British folklorist and "the driving force behind the revival of folk dancing in Wales."{{Cite web |last=Hyde |first=Dale |date=2012|title=Welsh Folk Dance History |url=https://socalfolkdance.org/articles/welsh_folk_dance_history_hyde.htm |access-date=2024-03-17 |website=Folk Dance Federation of California, South}} She was the founding president of the Welsh Folk Dance Society in 1949.
Early life and education
Blake was born in Streatham, London, the daughter of Henry Fownes Turner and Amy Dickes Turner. Her mother died in 1893, and she was raised in the household of an aunt and uncle.
File:Memorial plaque, Llangwm - geograph.org.uk - 1234255.jpg
Career
Blake served as a nurse, driver, and cook during World War I, in Serbia, Romania, and Russia. She was a member of the English Folk Dance and Song Society, and while she was living in Wales made a study of traditional Welsh folk dances, and taught dances to children. She "almost singlehandedly rescued the remaining fragments of a once common Welsh tradition".{{Cite web |date=10 April 2007 |title=Welsh Folk Dancing - Almost lost without trace |url=https://museum.wales/articles/1043/Welsh-Folk-Dancing---Almost-lost-without-trace/ |access-date=2024-03-17 |website=Museum Wales |language=en}} She was the founding president of the Welsh Folk Dance Society in 1949.{{Cite web |title=Welsh Folk Dance History - Dawnsio |url=https://dawnsio.cymru/dances/welsh-folk-dance-history/ |access-date=2024-03-18 |language=en-US}} She was a dance judge at the National Eisteddfod, lectured to local groups on her work,{{Cite news |date=1951-03-09 |title=West Mid-Glamorgan Group Meeting |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-glamorgan-gazette-west-mid-glamorgan/143586603/ |access-date=2024-03-18 |work=The Glamorgan Gazette |pages=7 |via=Newspapers.com}} and helped the Urdd Gobaith Cymru youth organization on teaching Welsh dances to young people.{{Cite news |date=1964-04-03 |title=Aberfan Folk Festival Planned for June |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-glamorgan-gazette-aberfan-folk-festi/143586884/ |access-date=2024-03-18 |work=The Glamorgan Gazette |pages=6 |via=Newspapers.com}} She was admitted into the Gorsedd Cymru in 1960.{{Cite web |last=Palfrey |first=Eiry |title=Blake, Lois (1890 - 1974), historian and promoter of Welsh folk dancing |url=https://biography.wales/article/s12-BLAK-LOI-1890#?c=0&m=0&s=0&cv=14&manifest=https://damsssl.llgc.org.uk/iiif/2.0/1488183/manifest.json&xywh=1064,1749,745,813 |access-date=2024-03-17 |website=Dictionary of Welsh Biography}}
Publications
- Welsh Morris and other Country Dances (1938, with W. S. Gwynn Williams)
- Welsh Folk Dance (1948){{Cite journal |date=January 1949 |title=Review of 'Welsh Folk Dance', by Lois Blake (The Gwynn Publishing Co., Llangollen, North Wales, 1948.) 20 pp. |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-the-international-folk-music-council/article/abs/welsh-folk-dance-by-lois-blake-the-gwynn-publishing-co-llangollen-north-wales-1948-20-pp/5C4E71BA742D9DD96121202307C2C3A3 |journal=Journal of the International Folk Music Council |language=en |volume=1 |pages=65–66 |doi=10.2307/835952 |jstor=835952 |issn=0950-7922|url-access=subscription }}
- Dances of England and Wales (1950, with Maud Karpeles)
- The Llangadfan Dances (1954, with W. S. Gwynn Williams)
- "The Three Merry Dances of Wales" (1958)Blake, Mrs. Lois. "The Three Merry Dancers of Wales." Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society (1958): 166-167.
- Welsh Folk Dancing and Costume (1965){{Cite book |last=Blake |first=Lois |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ln3ptgAACAAJ |title=Welsh Folk Dancing and Costume |date=1965 |publisher=Gwynn Pub. |language=en}}{{Cite news |last=Roberts |first=Gwilym |date=1954-04-22 |title=Day to Day in Wales; Welsh folk dancing |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/liverpool-daily-post-day-to-day-in-wales/143587498/ |access-date=2024-03-18 |work=Liverpool Daily Post |pages=1 |via=Newspapers.com}}
- "The Nantgarw Dances" (1966){{Cite journal |last=Blake |first=Loïs |date=1966 |title=The Nantgarw Dances |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4521744 |journal=Folk Music Journal |volume=1 |issue=2 |pages=102–106 |jstor=4521744 |issn=0531-9684}}
- Traditional Dance and Customs in Wales (1972)Blake, Lois. Traditional Dance and Customs in Wales. Gwynn Publishing Company, 1972.
- "The General Characteristics of Welsh Folk Dance" (1974)Blake, Lois. "The general characteristics of Welsh Folk Dance." Welsh Folk Dance Society Journal 75 (1974).
Personal life and legacy
Turner married marine engineer Leonard James Blake in 1917. They lived mainly in Llangwm, Wales, and had two children, Felicity (born 1920) and James (born 1918). Her son died in 1945, and her husband died in 1959. She moved to Bristol in widowhood, to live with her daughter, and died in 1974, at the age of 84, at Marshfield. There is a Lois Blake Memorial Trophy presented at the National Eisteddfod, for performing one of the Nantgarw dances Blake documented.{{Cite news |date=1996-07-12 |title=Memories in music |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-vale-advertiser-memories-in-music/143587736/ |access-date=2024-03-18 |work=The Vale Advertiser |pages=4 |via=Newspapers.com}}
References
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Category:People from Streatham