Vera Wardner Dougan was born in Chicago, July 7, 1895, the youngest child of Dr. Morton Wardner and Evaline Anderson Wardner. From childhood she was an eager student of piano and ballet, studying at the Haylett School of Dance and the American Conservatory of Music.

After graduation from high school, she did social work at the Association House in Chicago (similar to Jane Addams’ Hull House). She also continued her musical studies. She and a small coterie of volunteers were on call at the Chicago Opera as interpretive dancers, as the opera had no official ballet at that time. She danced as a wood nymph in more than one movie with the young Charlie Chaplin.

She was offered a combination scholarship and teaching position at MacMurray College in Jacksonville, Illinois, and so, while earning her Bachelor of Arts degree, was also a faculty member teaching ballet, swimming, and coaching sports. She won high honors and created some of the loveliest pageants of that era. Her alma mater in 1966 honored her with a Doctor of Music degree.

After graduation, she taught French, English, and music for a time at Winchester High School. In 1922 she received two opportunities: to return to MacMurray as a faculty member or to do reconstruction social work in France. She chose the latter and spent a year in Chateau Thierry on the staff of the Methodist Memorial, where she taught ballet, piano, and English to French children.

It was there she met Ronald Dougan, a Northwestern University student doing boys’ work in scouting and recreation and also teaching English. They were married in Chateau Thierry on May 2, 1923, with Dr. Joseph Harker of MacMurray performing the ceremony.

The couple returned to Beloit in the autumn of 1934. Vera became active in teaching dance and participating in community activities, as well as bearing four children by January of 1930. Her dance recitals on the lawn of the big house at Dougan Dairy and at Theodore Lyman Wright Art Hall of Beloit College are still remembered. She was also the director of several city-wide pageants in the 1930s.

In Beloit, Vera Dougan wanted her children to have the musical opportunities she herself had. There was then no string program in the Beloit schools; she imported a teacher from Rockford by rounding up a day’s worth of students, including the Dougan children. The fruition of the string activity made possible the Beloit Janesville Symphony, founded by Lewis and Pat Dougan Dalvit in the early 1950s. Vera Dougan was instrumental in beginning the symphony’s supportive women’s guild. The symphony’s concertmaster’s chair is endowed in her name.

Vera Dougan found on coming to Beloit a splendid and strong music club, Treble Clef, which she joined as a solo ballet and piano member. She was its president in 1937. Through Treble Clef, she became acquainted with the Federation of Music Clubs, accepting offices in the Wisconsin Federation, then the Central Region and ultimately, after being on the national board, became national president in 1956. She served two distinguished terms.

She remained active in the National Federation of Music Clubs, holding continuing posts of responsibility until near her death. She was publishing articles in the NFMC Music Clubs magazine through the summer of 1987.

She was a member of Sigma Alpha Iota Musical Fraternity, TEO, National Association of Music Therapy, was in Who’s Who in America, and was a patron of Beloit Art League and Beloit College Players.

Vera died just 10 days short of her 83rd birthday in 1988.