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March 3: Arthur Murray

lawrencebush
March 3, 2011

The man who taught America how to ballroom dance, Arthur Murray (Moses Teichmann), died on this date in 1991, one month short of his 96th birthday. An immigrant to the U.S. at age 2, he began teaching night classes in dance at age 17 while working as a draftsman; among other jobs he held was reporting for the New Haven Register. Murray developed several dance-related businesses, including mail-order dance “footprint” patterns and a series of dance-instruction studios that numbered more than 3,500 when he and his wife Kathryn retired in 1964. Their popular television show, The Arthur Murray Party, ran for ten years in the 1950s, moving from network to network. Among their students were Eleanor Roosevelt, the Duke of Windsor, John D. Rockefeller, Elizabeth Arden, and Jack Dempsey. Murray was inducted into the National Museum of Dance Hall of Fame in Saratoga in 2007.

“Over 40 million people have enhanced their social life by learning to dance quickly and easily the Arthur Murray way!” —Arthur Murray Studios ad