Lois Blake


Lois Blake, born Lois Agnes Fownes Turner, was a British folklorist and "the driving force behind the revival of folk dancing in Wales." 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.

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". She was the founding president of the Welsh Folk Dance Society in 1949. She was a dance judge at the National Eisteddfod, lectured to local groups on her work, and helped the Urdd Gobaith Cymru youth organization on teaching Welsh dances to young people. She was admitted into the Gorsedd Cymru in 1960.

Publications

Turner married marine engineer Leonard James Blake in 1917. They lived mainly in Llangwm, Wales, and had two children, Felicity and James. 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.