“I have been dancing since I was five, I grew up dancing at a dance studio.”

For dance teacher and drill team director Nicole Nothe, her journey in dance was preordained. 

“I thought about putting her in dance when I saw her at the age of 10-months-old hanging on my old record player,” Nothe’s mom, Anita Prichett said. “As we called her dancing with the music and just smiling and so happy.  Even at a young age I could tell she had a God given talent for music and movement.”

But it wasn’t as if Nothe discovered her talent in a vacuum. Her path was laid out by her mom. 

“My mom was a dancer, I’m from a family of dancers, It was just kind of natural, in the genes to continue with it,” Nothe said. “My mom was on a drill team, so that opened up the door for me to try being on a drill team as well, so it was really special for me to be on the same drill team as my mom.”

That was just the start of Nothe following in her mom’s footsteps. 

Founded in 1947 by Mildred Stringer, the Tyler Junior College Apache Belles are one of the first drill teams ever created.

It’s where Nothe continued her dancing after high school. But it almost didn’t happen as she had originally taken interest in the Kilgore Rangerettes.

“In high school, I was interested in the Kilgore Rangerettes and I knew about the Apache Belles. The short story, a very funny story, was that I wanted to be a Kilgore Rangerettes, because one of my cousins was a Kilgore Rangerette,” Nothe said. “My mom was like ” let’s go see the Tyler Apache Belles” and I was mad, I didn’t want to go, I was acting like a little brat.”

But after getting a feel of the environment in Tyler, she came around to the idea of being a Belles rather than a Rangerette.

“It turned out when I went and sat through one of their practices and all the Apache Belles introduced themselves, I knew my mom was right,” Nothe said. “I knew the Lord had put me in that atmosphere at the right time and the right place, that’s where I felt like that was my calling, to be a Belle not a Rangerette. I think Rangerettes opened up my eyes to where I was really supposed to be.”

As a captain with the Belles, Nothe learned to collaborate with others, which is something she does daily with her fellow dance teacher and drill team officer, Sarah Cadungug.

“All my experience, because I danced in college too, shaped who I am, and why I wanted to teach. Having the mentors and the coaches I had helped me prepare,” Cadungug said. “With Nothe and I both having those experiences, we definitely love to collaborate with what we know and new ideas to help everybody be successful. Having those experiences definitely has helped us.”

The idea of leadership wasn’t the only thing she passed down, but also the importance of tradition.

“In Red Rhythm, we have a traditional Texas high kick, you don’t see many drill teams high kick anymore, it’s more on the rare side and it’s hard,” Nothe said. “Now my girls are doing it here on campus as well. With high schools, even though we may not be up to par with college drill teams, we need to still keep the tradition alive, like our college drill teams are.”

“She did a routine hat dance and that was from the Apache Belles,” Red Rhythm Officer Kelsey Madden said. “We took that and we were able to incorporate that into our drill team. We do the hat dance and it’s just one of our routines we do in the stands at football games.”

Despite a lifetime of dancing, leading Red Rhythm or any high school drill team isn’t something Nothe assumed would happen. 

“I didn’t really think there was a career for me to be able to teach dance because with teaching dance, there’s only one spot at each campus, so it’s very competitive to get the job,” she said. “I double majored in dance and took the chance. Someone in college talked to me, and convinced me that I could be a drill team director when I was second guessing myself, and now here I am.”