Mary Hinkson

Mary De Haven Hinkson, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on March 16, 1925, was an African American dancer, choreographer, and teacher whose career spanned modern dance, ballet, opera, and Broadway. She died in Manhattan on November 26, 2014, of pulmonary fibrosis, at the age of 89. Her father was a physician who served as the first African American head of an army hospital, and her mother worked as a public school teacher. Hinkson is best known for her long association with the Martha Graham Dance Company and for breaking racial barriers across multiple institutions throughout her career.

Hinkson attended Philadelphia High School for Girls, where she studied formalized gymnastics and competed in that discipline, which she understood at the time to be the closest available equivalent to dance training. She also encountered Dalcroze technique through a high school eurythmics class and was introduced to Native American dance forms at summer camp, where she was taught by Doris Haywood. She did not receive formal dance training until enrolling at the University of Wisconsin, where she studied under Margaret H'Doubler, the head of the dance department and a pioneer in establishing dance as an academic major. H'Doubler emphasized kinesthetic awareness and a scientific approach to movement, guiding students to test the physical limits of their bodies through exercises such as creating movement while blindfolded on the floor and then reconstructing it standing. Hinkson also studied with a technique teacher named Louise, who had trained under Mary Wigman and Hanya Holm and taught in an internal, lyrical style rooted in Holm's approach.

At Wisconsin, Hinkson joined Orchesis, an audition-based dance group, and made her stage debut in a production of Orpheus and Eurydice. A local African American newspaper identified her and fellow dancer Matt Turney as the first African American members of the group. Hinkson and Turney lived together at the Groves Women's Cooperative, as African American students at the university were frequently excluded from dormitories and nearby rooming houses despite being permitted to enroll. Hinkson graduated in 1946 and spent an additional year in graduate coursework before joining the faculty of the Department of Physical Education for Women at Wisconsin, becoming one of the first Black women to teach at a majority-white university. During their junior and senior years, Hinkson and several classmates — including Turney, Miriam Cole, and Sage Fuller Cowles — formed the Wisconsin Dance Group, traveling the country in a shared car to perform works they had choreographed themselves, continuing this work after graduation.

It was at H'Doubler's encouragement that Hinkson first attended a Martha Graham Dance Company performance in Wisconsin in the 1940s. After relocating to New York with the intention of training further, Hinkson was selected to participate in a 1951 demonstration organized by Graham that included works from Dark Meadows, Diversion of Angels, and Sarabande. During that demonstration she stepped into a larger role that had been left vacant and performed alongside Bertram Ross. Graham recognized her abilities and invited her to join the company. In 1952, during her first official season with the company, Graham choreographed a role specifically for Hinkson in Canticle for Innocent Comedians, for which Hinkson was required to source her own dogwood branches as props. The company's sponsored season opened on April 13, 1953, at the Alvin Theater, with support from the B. de Rothschild Foundation.

Hinkson also worked with the New York City Opera during periods away from the Graham company, where she auditioned for choreographer John Butler. She later learned that Butler had initially confused her with Matt Turney, though she was ultimately selected to perform. She found the opera environment to be more professionally structured than the Graham company. To supplement her income in the early years of her career, she gave private lessons and built toward a teaching career that eventually included positions at the Juilliard School of Music, the Dance Theatre of Harlem, and the Ailey School.

Her Broadway career extended from 1960 to 1968 and included three productions: Martha Graham and Company, Milk and Honey, and A Time of Snow. In 1958, Hinkson and her husband Julien Jackson had their only child, a daughter named Jennifer.