More than a teacher

For the kids who came from all over the country to learn from him, Petrus Bosman was more than a teacher. He was a human window, providing a glimpse of a shining place in the distance — or perhaps, for the lucky ones, in their future.

“He knew all these famous people,” said Nick Leschke, now a principal dancer with the Houston Ballet. “He had danced on all these famous stages all over the world. The London Ballet. Margot Fonteyn. That all really meant something.”

During my years in Lynchburg, I have occasionally encountered people who seemed to have no business being here, like migratory birds that had lost their way. Petrus was one of them.

He walked with a spring in his step, spoke with a South African accent left over from his childhood, and seemed to make no distinction between legends like Fonteyn (whom he knew well) and those who struggled to learn rudimentary moves on the second floor of the Virginia School of the Arts. To him, it was all one world, seamless.

“He was always saying, ‘The cream will rise to the top,’” Leschke said Thursday, a few days after Bosman died of a heart attack in Indianapolis. “The ones who worked the hardest would get the most attention and the most rewards.”

In a way, Bosman trained his students the way you would train your golden retriever — with firmness, kindess and occasional treats.

Recalled Abby Fellman: “Every so often, Mr. Bosman would walk into class with a brown paper bag from Magnolia’s. As soon as we saw that bag, we all knew what it meant: Chocolate! The bag would be filled with little chocolates that he would toss to us throughout class if we did something well. He always seemed the happiest on those days.”

Lynchburg — at least the part generally termed “Old Lynchburg” — loved Petrus Bosman. In case you haven’t noticed, there is a deep Anglophile vein running just below the surface in this town. There are still people who name their houses, adopt an English air of politeness and care deeply about what happens to the royal family.

This immediately registered on Bosman’s radar, and over 17 years, he always gave “his” people exactly what they wanted. The annual performance by his VSA class wasn’t just a recital — he turned it into an “Evening of Elegance” and rummaged through his extensive Roladex to invite professional dancers from all over the world to participate. Lynchburg loved it.

In return, he loved Lynchburg. Even after he and the VSA parted company, he had no intention of ever leaving.

I got to know Petrus because it was unavoidable. I work for a newspaper, and he was a cheerfully persistent publicity hound — not for himself, but for his dancers. He practically lived in our Lifestyle department, and his gentle prodding accelerated considerably when it was time for the Evening of Elegance.

This advocacy didn’t stop with the media. Every dancer who wanted to continue his or her career had an automatic advocate in Bosman, who seemed to know every director of every dance company in the U.S., if not the world.

“It definitely helped me to have studied under him,” said Leschke, one of a steady stream of VSA students fro, of all places, Manitowoc, Wis. “It opened doors.”

A few months ago, Petrus asked me to have lunch at his favorite place, Magnolia Foods on Rivermont.

“I have some exciting news,” he said.

Which was, that he had scheduled a whole array of teaching gigs over the summer, including one at the Jordan Academy of Dance at Butler University in Indianapolis, run by a former student, Nataly North-Lowder.

“He never let me down,” she told our reporter, Casey Gillis, after his death.

His style as a teacher was hands-on — or maybe, in the case of ballet, feet-on.

“He’d always show up in sweat pants and ballet shoes.,” said Leschke, “or he’d just take his shoes off and dance in his socks.”

People were always stunned to find out his age. He died at 80 with the body of a 50-year-old.

I don’t know exactly what transpired between Bosman and the School for the Arts, and I won’t speculate here. But I got the sense that his “news flash” was an affirmation that he wasn’t too old to continue what he had always done. He seemed as timeless as the roles he danced.

Now, in the memories of his multitude of students, he will be.