American tap dancer.

Born in Hampton, Iowa, Dean Diggins, the son of a music teacher, began dance lessons at an early age, and by the time he was a teen-ager he was giving dance lessons and operating two dance studios. During a stint in the army he performed for Special Services, and after discharge he moved to Chicago to study at the Stone-Camryn School. From Chicago he settled in New York, where he learned from and worked closely with Paul Draper, the inventor of ballet tap.

In 1957, Diggins formed the Mattison Trio with Guy Tanno and Dorothy Matthews, a balletic tap group that toured for ten years, performing regularly on television and in nightclubs and summer theaters. Then Diggins made a career change, earning a doctorate in psychology and going on to teach at Brooklyn College until he retired to Kittery, Maine. However, he did not retire from dancing, and in 1989 he performed Morton Gould’s Concerto For Tap Dancer and Orchestra with the Houston Symphony at the symphony’s 75th Anniversary concert. Diggins continued to perform, broadening his repertoire by applying balletic tap choreography to other classical works, including compositions by Bach, Handel, Haydn and others. He also wrote several books, one a manual for tap teachers entitled “Tap Technique,” which ends with exercises taught by his mentor, Paul Draper.