Our friend Rona Hart, who has died aged 88, was a celebrated dancer and teacher who in 1946 founded the Rona Hart School of Dance, in Hampstead, north London. She taught there until her retirement in 1998, and the school still flourishes.
Her formative years were spent in Africa. The daughter of Iris (nee Goose) and Arthur Hart, Rona was born in Uganda, where her father worked for the colonial service as a surveyor. Rona was taught traditional local dances by her ayah. Her family returned to the UK, settling in Cornwall, when Rona was seven, and initially she was educated at home. During the second world war, they moved to Hertfordshire, and Rona boarded at Abbot’s Hill school, Hemel Hempstead, where she excelled in mathematics. But despite her parents’ desire for her to study the subject at university, she knew that dance would be her life.
Banging on the door of the Ballet Rambert in London, Rona insisted on an impromptu audition, and so impressed them that she was given a scholarship on the spot. After finishing her training (alongside Audrey Hepburn), she realised she preferred teaching to performing, and decided to set up her own school. Her great love was classical Greek dance.
Many of her students , who included the actor Helena Bonham Carter and the Royal Ballet choreographer David Dawson, kept in touch with her over the years. An exhibition in her honour was held at Burgh House, Hampstead, in 2013.
In 1958, Rona married George Newson, a carpenter, and they moved to Suffolk, from where Rona commuted to London for part of each week, into her 70s. Always smiling, welcoming, warm and thoughtful, she was a generous host at the family home in the village of Aldringham.
She was a stamp collector, with a special interest in Africa, and a member of the Leiston and District Philatelic Society. She was also a keen family historian and a founder member of the Alde Valley Suffolk Family History Group, which is where I met her. She became a committee member, organising speakers for our meetings, and gave a memorable talk to us on her life in ballet.
It was peppered with amusing anecdotes: she told us that from the window of her flat in London she had a splendid view of Vivien Leigh sunbathing on a neighbouring rooftop; and that on one occasion during her childhood in Uganda she had met Queen Mary, who apologised to Rona for nearly tripping her up with her walking stick.
She is survived by George, their three children, Jeremy, Melanie and Charlotte, five grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.
