People, Locations, Episodes

Simmie Knox, Portrait Artist born

*Simmie Knox was born on this date in 1935. He is an African American artist.

From Aliceville, Alabama, his father was a carpenter and mechanic. After Knox’s parents divorced he lived with his father’s sister on a farm in Leroy, Alabama. This arrangement occurred while his father lived and worked in another city until young Knox was nine. As a boy his first love was baseball, which he played with friends one of which was Hank Aaron. Yet during a game, a ball hit Knox in the eye forcing him to put the game down for more than a year.

The Federal Arts Project Begins

*On this date in 1935, The Federal Art Project (FAP) began.  This was the visual arts arm of the American Great Depression-era Works Progress Administration (WPA), a Federal One program. Funded under the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act 1935, it operated from 1935 until 1943. It was created as a relief measure to employ artists and artisans to […]

Richard Hunt, Sculptor born

*Richard Hunt was born on this date in 1935. He is a Black sculptor. Richard Howard Hunt was born on Chicago’s South Side. He and his younger sister Marian moved to Galesburg, Illinois, at eleven years old, where he spent most of his time in Chicago. From an early age, he was interested in the […]

“Porgy and Bess” Opens on Broadway

On this date in 1935,”Porgy and Bess” opened on Broadway. This was the first American folk opera about the lives of Black Americans.

“Porgy and Bess” was first performed in 1935, with music by George Gershwin, libretto by DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin and DuBose Heyward. It tells the story of African American life in the fictitious Catfish Row (based on the real-life Cabbage Row) in Charleston, S.C. in the early 1920s.

‘Mulatto'(The Play) Debuts on Broadway

*On this date in 1935 Mulatto: A Tragedy of the Deep South had its Broadway debut.   This was a play about race issues by Langston Hughes. Martin Jones produced it, running for 11 months and 373 performances.  It was one of the earliest Broadway plays to combine father-son conflict with race issues. Historian Joseph McLaren noted that the play was […]

Raven Wilkinson, Ballet Dancer, and Actress born

*Raven Wilkinson’s birth in 1935 is celebrated on this date. She is an African American ballet dancer (semi-retired) and actress.

From New York City, her mother was influential pursuing ballet training for her. Wilkinson began studying with a well-known Russian dancer when she was nine. After being inspired by seeing Janet Collins on stage in the early 1950s, she left school in her teens to pursue ballet full time. When the director of Ballet de Russe purchased Monte Carlo, her ballet school the students were invited to try out for his company.

Martina Arroyo, Classical Vocalist born

*Martina Arroyo was born on this date in 1936.  She is an Afro Puerto Rican operatic soprano and educator.  She was born in New York City, the younger of two children of Demetrio Arroyo, originally from Puerto Rico, and Lucille Washington, a native of Charleston, South Carolina. Her older brother is a Baptist minister. The family lived in Harlem near St. Nicholas Avenue and 111th Street. Her […]

Sylvia Williams, Curator born

*Sylvia H. Williams was born on this date in 1936.  She was a Black museum director, curator, art historian, and scholar of African art.    Sylvia Louise Hill was born and grew up in Lincoln, Pennsylvania. Her father was a professor of English and dean at Lincoln University. She married Charlton Williams, and the couple never had children. Williams held art history degrees […]

Voodoo Macbeth Debuts on Stage

*The opening of Voodoo Macbeth was on this date in 1936. This play was a New York William Shakespeare’s Macbeth production through the Federal Theatre Project.   Orson Welles adapted and directed the show, moved the play’s setting from Scotland to a fictional Caribbean Island, and recruited an entirely Black cast.  It earned the nickname for his production from […]

Helen Walker-Hill, Musicologist and Pianist born.

*Helen Walker-Hill was born on this date in 1936. She was a white-Canadian pianist and musicologist who specialized in honoring Black women composers’ music. Helen Siemens was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. She received her early musical training from her mother, Margaret Siemens, and continued piano studies with Emma Endres Kountz in Toledo, Ohio. She […]

Louis Gossett, Film/TV Actor born

*Louis Gossett was born on this date in 1936. He was a Black actor. Louis Cameron Gossett Jr. was born in Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York City, to Hellen Rebecca Wray, a nurse, and Louis Gossett Sr., a Pulman porter. He is an alumnus of Mark Twain Intermediate School 239 and Abraham Lincoln High School. […]

Julia López, Artist born

*The birth of Julia López is celebrated on this date in 1936.  She is a self-taught Afro Mexican painter. López was born in a small village near the town of Ometepec on the Costa Chica of Guerrero. She was one of eight daughters born to African and (Amuzgo) indigenous heritage parents.  Her mother and father […]

The Negro Actors Guild Begins

*On this date in 1936, the Negro Actors Guild (NAG) is celebrated.   Formed in 1936, the Negro Actors Guild of America (NAG) wanted to eliminate stereotyping of African Americans in theatrical and cinematic performances.  They began operation in 1937 to create better opportunities for black actors during a period in America when the country was […]

Lou Stovall, Print-Maker born

Lou Stovall, an African American master printmaker and artist, was born on this date in 1937.

Born in Athens, Georgia, he grew up in Springfield, MA, where he attended Technical High School. Stovall initially studied art at the Rhode Island School of Design and at Howard University where he received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree. Since 1962, he has lived and worked in Washington, D.C. Over the years he has won numerous awards, but perhaps his most enduring legacy is his work in the community.

Grace Bumbry, Opera Singer born

This date celebrates the birth of Grace Bumbry, an African American opera singer, in 1937.

She was born Grace Ann Bumbry in St. Louis, Missouri. She studied music at Boston University, Northwestern University, and the Music Academy of the West. She has has performed as both a soprano and a mezzo-soprano. While at Northwestern she became the student and protégé of Lotte Lehmann, a famous German-born opera diva.