Mary-Ellen Moylan

Mary Ellen Moylan (August 24, 1925 – April 28, 2020) was an American ballet dancer. She was one of the first students of George Balanchine's School of American Ballet, and made her New York stage debut in 1942. She had danced with Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, Ballet Society, Ballet Theatre (now American Ballet Theatre), Metropolitan Opera Ballet, and on Broadway. She was best known for performing Balanchine's works, and was described as "the first great Balanchine dancer". She retired from performing in 1957.

Early life and training Mary Ellen Moylan was born on August 24, 1925, in Cincinnati, Ohio, to an Irish builder father and schoolteacher mother. Due to the Great Depression, the family moved to St. Petersburg, Florida, in 1931, when she was six, to find work. Her mother sent her to a local ballet school.

When Moylan was eleven, her mother read about the School of American Ballet, newly founded by George Balanchine, from a magazine, and sent Moylan to the school. She first attended month-long summer sessions for two years. In 1940, at age 14, Moylan started attending the school full-time while living with her aunt in Manhattan.

Ballet career In 1942, at age 17, Moylan made her New York stage debut in a one-off Balanchine ballet Pas de Trois for Piano and Two Dancers, alongside Nicholas Magallanes for a Russian War Relief performance. She recalled, "When a person so young and inexperienced is onstage in a situation like that, I don’t think they know enough to be as terrified as they should be." On her performance in Ballet Imperial, New York Times critic John Martin commented, "She is definitely a talented dancer who is worth watching." She performed in Rosalinda for a year. She and Francisco Moncion created the lead roles in Balanchine's Divertimento the following year, though she only danced it twice, and left Ballet Society the same year.

Post-ballet and personal life

In 1957, Moylan married Robert Stanley Bailes, a singer. They had a son and owned a hamburger stand in Costa Mesa, California. Bailes died in 1962 from diabetes. Her second husband, accountant Read Taylor Hanks, died from a heart attack a few years later. Her third marriage ended in an annulment in 1968. Then, she moved to Pleasant Valley, New York, and worked at Bennett College as a ballet teacher, purchasing agent and campus shop manager. After retiring from Bennett, she became interested in watercolor painting and held several exhibitions. She moved to San Jose, California, in 1996, and Washington State in 2007. Moylan died on April 28, 2020, in Redmond, Washington, aged 94.