Scope and arrangement
The Patricia (Lehrman) Dunn papers date from 1950 to 1986 and document her career as a dancer and her graduate research on modern dancers through photocopied research files and a small amount of dance files.
Research files hold correspondence, notes and articles she used for her research on Jack Cole, Ruth St. Denis, Loie Fuller, and the Denishawn School of Dancing. Correspondence and notes are original and the articles are photocopies. The majority of the correspondence is from Denishawn dancer Anne Austin (Crane) and concerns a biography written by Austin on Jake Cole, which Dunn edited. The biography itself is present in multiple drafts. Also present is a letter from dancer Eleanor King to Austin regarding "The Early Years" festival at the State University of New York. The articles are sometimes annotated and include theses written by other scholars, journal articles, and newspaper clippings. Some of Dunn's essays are present and include "La Loie: American in Paris;" "The Natural Gifts of Isadora Duncan, Ruth St. Denis, and Katherine Dunham;" and an annotated bibliography entitled "Researching Jack Cole: The Adelphi Years."
Dunn's dancing career is documented through production files and a scrapbook that contains copies of articles, programs, contracts, correspondence, and an autobiography. The autobiography is located at the beginning of the scrapbook and references the remaining material through footnotes. Production files hold articles and program copies and some original performance photographs for Of All Things, On the Riviera, and Kismet.
Arrangement
The collection is arranged into Research Files and Dance Files.