Original founder of Glendale, Wendy Merson was born in Wallington, Surrey, the youngest of 4 children. Going into show business at the age of just 12, she worked as a dancer with the ‘Victoria Girls’ and Billy Cotton’s Showband. Continuing her dance training in London with many of the greats of the day in her own time while she was working in professional shows, often guest star soloists in the shows would give her lessons, allowing her to gather vibrant and fresh styles including the hot ‘new’ trend of American Tap. At that time there was little available for anyone wanting dance training alongside Classical Ballet: ‘Musical Comedy’, as Modern was then known, and Stage Dance was in its infancy.

After marrying her first husband, she went on to open her own dance classes. Moving to Worthing at the outbreak of war with her young son Michael, she opened what is now Glendale Theatre Arts in a variety of hired halls. Famed for her teaching of acrobatics – she herself was an incredible acrobat - and tap; she was the first to bring the ‘new’ American style of tap to the area. A self-taught pianist, which is surprising as her mother was a piano teacher and music runs in the family veins, she played by ear for most of her own classes with improvised tunes; always bang on the needed beat and with the musicality required for whatever was being danced. She always had a grand sense of performance that was matched by her out-going personality and love of dance. Wendy Merson entered pupils in the earliest of festivals from her first years in Worthing and went on to help Worthing Music and Arts Festival establish a strong dance section. Her peak was when she finally had her own premises in Victoria Road, Worthing with studios downstairs and accommodation above, which was where she gave birth to her daughter, Mandy, having married for a second time. It was a sad day when she chose to move with her husband and young daughter out of the area and relinquish her Victoria Road base although she was to return a few years later to slowly rebuild Glendale School of Dance.

Great friends with another local legend and teacher, Miss Jean Ramsey, they brought a lot of fun and laughter to competitive events, not least the time they both added themselves on to the end of a ballet class line-up for the adjudication, both in tutus, much to the confusion of the adjudicator! A great believer in the arts supporting great causes, her charity shows would sell out and she led a concert team performing far and wide in Sussex and London.

Known to everyone as ‘Miss Wendy’, her entertaining approach to teaching (sitting at the piano with a cigarette in the corner of her mouth) coupled with her great knowledge of her arts meant she was a popular and much-loved figure although her methods might not have been quite so well-received in today’s world!

Many of her pupils went on to perform and teach not least her own daughter, Mandy Chapman, now Principal of Glendale.