Women's Services

Algie

Young Algie Eggertsen spent Saturdays helping her mother keep house for BYU-student boarders. Midway through her own studies at BYU, Algie accepted a call from the Church to teach at Ricks Academy in Rexburg, Idaho. While chaperoning an academy dance she met George Ballif, whom she married four years later.

Returning to Provo, Algie graduated, nursed her family through a flu epidemic, and then joined the BYU faculty. At her urging, the physical education department added dance classes for women and changed the dance uniform from wool serge gym suits to gingham dresses. Algie spent the summer of 1922 with her husband in Boston: he attended law school and she studied dance at Radcliffe College. The next fall, her dance courses at BYU received accreditation.

Algie and George became parents of four children. Algie served as president of the Utah American Legion Auxiliary, 23-year member of the Provo school board, and legislator for the state House of Representatives. She hosted Utah's pavilion at the New York World's Fair and chaired the Utah Democratic Party. Eleanor Roosevelt invited Algie to serve on the Education Subcommittee of the U.S. Commission on the Status of Women. In 1965 Algie entered what she called her "working grandmother" phase: she accepted her first salaried position since the birth of her daughter, 40 years before.
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Algie