Inga Andersen

Inga Hensina Andersen (March 10, 1909 – September 28, 1959) was a Canadian singer and dancer, born in Argentina of Danish heritage. She began learning to dance as a young girl and became a dance teacher in her teens. By 1940, she performed on the radio, television, and stage. She was a cabaret singer, who also wrote the lyrics for songs that she sang. She sang, danced, acted, and played the violin. in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to Metha Andersen and A.P. Andersen, builder, and lumberyard owner, moved the business and family to Prince George.

Andersen grew up in Prince George. She first learned to dance by her mother when she was a little girl. Then she followed a correspondence course to dance and become a star "in 15 easy lessons" and books. She refined her technique and skills by taking courses every summer in locales such as Detroit, New York, Pittsburgh, and Seattle. After studying at the Barbes School of Dance in Vancouver, she returned to Prince George and began teaching young girls at age 16. Andersen and her students were in a number of recitals in 1928 and 1929, including the Yambo dance. She also taught fur trappers to dance.

Career Ballet dancers trained by choreographer and dancer Albertina Rasch (1891-1967), reflected in a mirror. In Los Angeles, she studied dance at Albertina Rasch's studio in 1929 She went on to tour with the Rasch troupe throughout the U.S., ending in New Orleans. From there, she got work in New York in The Girl of the Golden West and Ballyhoo, performed with the Ziegfeld Follies, and Rasch asked Andersen to come to England to help with Wild Violets. It opened in Drury Lane in October 1932 and then toured the United Kingdom and South Africa. On a visit home to Prince George in the summer of 1937, Andersen was feted at a Board of Trade appreciation banquet, hailed as "a great inspiration to the children of the city...."

Andersen and Fred Stone toured with Smiley Faces. During World War II, she would not leave Europe for engagements in New York. In London, she also starred in Fig Leaves (February 1940), Cole Porter's Du Barry Was a Lady (1942), and Flying Colours (1943).

World War II

Ten days into World War II, Andersen began to perform for the British troops, the first entertainer to do so.

She became lost and went behind German enemy lines to play to 80,000 soldiers during the Battle of Monte Cassino in Italy. Among the soldiers that she performed for were Americans, one of who asked, "What in the name of blankety-blank are you doing here!?" Her days were often 18 hours long, without soap and without enough water for drinking let alone washing. Without dressing rooms, she sometimes used a tank or the backs of five soldiers to hide behind when she changed her clothes. She was interviewed for Sarah Churchill's television show. She met Sarah's famous father during that war and noted that he "smokes as much as my Dad." She was a guest performer for the International College of Surgeons' Convention in Buenos Aires, her birth city, where she met Eva Peron.

Andersen returned to Prince George in the late 1950s and died on September 28, 1959, aged 50. She was survived by her brother Henning, who lived in Vancouver, and her father, still living in Prince George. Her mother died August 1, 1941. Andersen is buried next to her parents, both whom are now deceased, in a cemetery at Prince George.