Cornish College of the Arts

the country. By 1923, opera and modern dance had been added to the curriculum as well.
In 1920, in recognition that music was no longer the school's central focus, the school's name was simplified to The Cornish School. By this time, too, the school had expanded its age range, and was offering classes and lessons from early childhood to the undergraduate level. The school gathered a board of trustees from among Seattle's elite, who funded the school through the hard economic times during and after World War I, and raised money for a purpose-built school building. Finished in 1921, the Cornish School building, now known as Kerry Hall, opened for the 1921–22 academic year.
The Cornish Trio of the 1920s—Peter Meremblum, Berthe Poncy (later Berthe Poncy Jacobson), and Kola Levienne—may have been the first resident chamber music group at an American school. In 1935, Cornish established the first (but ultimately short-lived) college-level school of radio broadcasting in the U.S.
Through the 1920s, the school was often …