Venerated Square Dance Caller’s Story Lives On At DU Dance Library

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<p>(Courtesy DU's Carson Brierly Giffin Dance Library)</p>
<p>Calvin “Cal” Golden calling a square dance.</p>
Photo: Square dance caller Cal Golden with profile shot
Square dance caller Calvin "Cal" Golden.

Golden's story is preserved at the University of Denver as part of the Carson Brierly Giffin Dance Library.

Established in 1972, the library includes materials about performance dance, such as modern and ballet, as well as ritual, liturgical and social dance. Photos of Golden can be found it the library's Lloyd Foundation Dance Archives, its biggest collection with more than 700 boxes of items about folk dance.

Since 2004, the library has also named a handful of choreographers, dancers, educators, directors and patrons "Living Legends of Dance in Colorado." Curator Katherine Crowe tells Colorado Matters that the library decided to record the oral histories of "living legends" after the unexpected death of Colorado Ballet co-founder Freidann Parker.

This year's honorees are former Colorado Ballet principal dancer Maria Mosina, Broadway performer and tap dancer Gene GeBauer, dance educator Fran Page, arts philanthropist Celeste Grynberg, and Vail Dance Festival director Damian Woetzel. They were celebrated earlier this month at DU.

Past "Living Legends of Dance in Colorado" honorees include:

Vera Sears, who fled Germany with her husband before World War II. She went on to direct the Children's Dance Theatre for the dance department at DU 's Lamont School of Music for 17 years.

Denver theater impresario Henry Lowenstein.

Charolette York Irey, who founded the University of Colorado Boulder dance degree program.

Founder and artistic director of Fiesta Colorado Jeanette Trujillo-Lucero.

Former USO majorette Hope Moore Wagonner.

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