Person
Biography
Bill Adams was a native New Englander who first came to the Pillow as a student in 1961, then returned on scholarship the following summer and later as a staff member during the 1967 and 1968 seasons. Through the connections he made at the Pillow with Maria Alba, Carola Goya, Matteo, and most importantly, La Meri, the course of Adams’s life was forever changed. He worked closely with La Meri’s Ethnic Dance Arts on Cape Cod throughout the 1970s, teaching, performing, and serving as company administrator. When La Meri retired to her native Texas in 1982, Adams moved with her as her personal secretary and caregiver. After La Meri’s death in 1988, Adams moved back to Connecticut where he continued to serve as caretaker for her legacy. Most importantly, he managed to track down a treasure-trove of La Meri’s personal archives, once entrusted to a prospective biographer and fortunately retained by family members after the biographer’s death. Thanks to Adams, these invaluable materials are now in the Jacob’s Pillow Archives where they are finally available to one and all. Though Bill Adams died in August 2015 at age 76, his connections to Jacob’s Pillow and La Meri live on.
Source of Biography
written by Norton Owen for Jacob's Pillow Remembers.
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