As a teen, Ernestine Myers enrolled in Madame Marie Jung’s eminent Chicago Musical College. Myers studied under the famous Ruth St Dennis and Ted Shawn in LA. She became a headliner in New York’s 81st Street Theater, Palace Theater, and Winter Gardens. Her creative specialty was combining acrobatic toe dancing with ballet and Creole dancing. She was also featured in the Ziegfeld Follies and in the movie Sinbad with Al Jolson. Eventually, she joined the Kieth and Shubert vaudeville companies on tour. When her business manager died in 1922, she canceled her bookings and returned to her hometown Terra Haute, Indiana. There she founded the Ernestine Myer’s School Of Dance which she ran for 54 years. In this portrait, she strikes a theatric pose with head tilted back and her signature gaze cast longingly in a far off direction. Her look is dramatized by long eyelashes and thick mascara typical of her portraits. She wears a satin headscarf and pearl bralette that dazzles in the dark contrast of the shot.