Russell Wortley Archive
The Russell Wortley Collection of Traditional Dance, Music and Custom Archive List and Indexes Archives of Cultural Tradition University of Sheffield January 1999 Contents Introduction Page Biographical History 3 Content and Character 4 Arrangement 5 Conditions of Access and Use 6 Collection List Printed, Manuscript, Photographic and Sound Recording Items 7 Newspaper Cuttings 138 Sound Recordings 139 Photographs 179 Index (Tune/Song Title) 195 Index (Subject, Personal/Corporate Name, Place Name) 202 2 ACT/97-022 The Russell Wortley Collection of Traditional Dance, 1870-1979 Music and Custom Biographical History1 As a scholar, collector, dancer and musician, Russell Wortley (1912-1980) had a keen interest in traditional English customs, folk song, music, dance and drama. After going to Haileybury School in Hertfordshire, he went in 1930 to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, where he read both parts of the Natural Sciences Tripos. During this time he became an enthusiastic dancer with both the Cambridge Morris Men and the Cambridge branch of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. After taking his degree he stayed on in Cambridge to undertake research in plant physiology at the School of Agriculture. He obtained his doctorate in 1938 and then took up a post with the Potato Virus Research Institute where he remained for the rest of his working life. His continued residence in Cambridge was especially valuable to the Cambridge Morris Men in helping give a stability and continuity to a club whose membership, like that of any university-based club, changes frequently and may often lack dancers of long experience. He was a faithful attendee at the club practices, giving their first morris instruction to many beginners, playing the pipe and tabor, and often bringing new light and fresh interpretation to familiar dances.
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