Rosella Hightower

Biography

Rosella Hightower (January 10, 1920 – November 4, 2008) was an American ballerina and member of the Choctaw Nation who achieved fame in both the United States and Europe.

Rosella Hightower was born in Durwood, Carter County, Oklahoma, the only child of Charles Edgar Hightower and his wife, the former Eula May Fanning. Of Choctaw heritage, she moved with her family to Kansas City, Missouri after her father took a new position with the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad. Hightower began her dance training in Kansas City under the instruction of Dorothy Perkins.

After a 1937 appearance by Russian choreographer and ballet dancer Léonide Massine in Kansas City with Wassily de Basil's Ballets Russes...