The African American Experience

1. Classical and Concert Music
From: The Harlem Renaissance

2. Dance and Dancers
From: The Harlem Renaissance

3. Theatre
From: The Harlem Renaissance

4. Entertainers
From: The Harlem Renaissance

5. Women of the Harlem Renaissance
From: The Harlem Renaissance

6. Aldridge, Ira (1807–1867).
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

7. Allison, Hughes (1908–c. 1974).
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

8. Anderson, Garland (1886–1939).
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

9. Andrews, Regina M. (1901–1993).
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

10. Angelou, Maya (born 1928).
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

11. Browne, Theodore (c. 1910–1979)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

12. Caldwell, Ben (born 1937)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

13. Carroll, Vinnette (1922–2003)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

14. Davis, Ossie (1917–2005)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

15. Drama
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

16. Dunham, Katherine (born 1909)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

17. Edmonds, S[heppard] Randolph (1900–1983)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

18. Free Southern Theater (1963–1979)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

19. Hill, Abram (1910–1986)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

20. introduction
From: The Black Teacher and the Dramatic Arts

21. King, Woodie, Jr. (born 1937)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

22. Minstrelsy
From: Encyclopedia of Racism in the United States

23. Moore, Charles Michael (1948–2003)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

24. Penny, Rob[ert] Lee (1941–2003)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

25. Richardson, Willis (1889–1977)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

26. The Politics of Representation in African American Theater and Drama
From: AFRICAN AMERICANS AND POPULAR CULTURE

27. Williams, Samm-Art (born 1946)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

28. Wilson, August (born 1945)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

29. Wilson, Francis H. [Frank] (1886–1956)
From: The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature

James Kirkwood as Colonel Thomas Norwood and Mercedes Gilbert as Cora Lewis in a scene from Mulatto, July 1936, Ambassador Theatre, New York. Courtesy of Billy Rose Theatre Collection, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations.

Noted actor Charles Gilpin, who performed the role of Brutus in the 1920 New York production of The Emperor Jones. His visit to Cleveland in 1922 led to the renaming of the Dumas Dramatic Club as the Gilpin Players. Courtesy of Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations.

Left to right: George Walker (husband of Hazel Mountain Walker), violinist Dorothy Smith, Hughes, and Lloyd Gentry at Karamu House, 1932. Courtesy of Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

Festus R.Fitzhugh performing the African spirit dance from the 1934 Karamu production of Eugene O’Neill’s The Emperor Jones. Fitzhugh, president of the Gilpin Players in the late 1930s, played the role of Ham in Little Ham and co-authored with Roland Mulhauser the play One Hundred in the Shade, also performed by the Gilpiners.

Left to right: Minnie Gentry as Rose and Hazel Mountain Walker as Aunt Billie. A scene from act 2 of Hughes’s When the Jack Hollers, 1936 Gilpin Players production, Karamu Theatre. Courtesy of Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

The “Ladies Drill Corps” in a scene from Hughes’s Joy to My Soul, 1937 Gilpin Players production, Karamu Theatre. Courtesy of Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

As reported in the March 23, 1939, California Eagle, an African American newspaper, Ed Walsh performed the leading role of the Young Man in Don’t You Want to Be Free?, staged in Los Angeles by the New Negro Theatre, which Hughes organized.

Left to right: Olive Blackwell, dance director; Bertha Moseley Lewis, associate director; Elizabeth Galbreath, publicity director; William Nix, associate director; Harvey Cogbill, technical director; Hughes; James H.Barr, director of the Good Shepherd Community Center Chorus. Hughes with staff of the Skyloft Players, the theatre group he organized in Chicago at the Good Shepherd Community Center, where The Sun Do Move was performed in 1942. Courtesy of Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

Left to right: Clifton Maclin as Rock, Robert Lucas as Frog, Charles Sebree, unknown. Scenes from The Sun Do Move, staged by the Skyloft Players in Chicago. Courtesy of Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

Pearl Primus, internationally renowned choreographer/dancer, who performed in For This We Fight.

Left to right: Owen Dodson, Hughes, Canada Lee, in support of the election of Roosevelt, 1944. Courtesy of Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

Marian Anderson.

Paul Robeson as Othello, 1944.

Josephine Baker as an expatriate in Paris, 1949.

Ntozake Shange. Used by permission of Ntozake Shange.

Roland Hayes (Library of Congress)

Paul Robeson (Library of Congress)

Students singing in the park

Crocker Boys lifting Carl

Running lights during a performance

Participants in the Summer Institute in Repertory Theatre, 1968

Staff members during a dialogue.Left to right: Thomas Pawley, Owen Dodson,Frank Silvera, Ted Shine, Theodore Hatlen.

Ben and Laura breaking up a fight between Willie Lee and Glenn

Moment of great decision

After the trial

Preparing sets for Fly Blackbird

Ben and Gussie talking

Ida Ray comforting Ben