Community Chat

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Althea Gibson

Growing up in Harlem, the young Gibson was a natural athlete. She started playing tennis at the age of 14 and the very next year won her first tournament, the New York State girls’ championship, sponsored by the American Tennis Association (ATA), which was organized in 1916 by black players as an alternative to the exclusively white USLTA. After prominent doctors and tennis enthusiasts Hubert Eaton and R. Walter Johnson took Gibson under their wing, she won her first of what would be 10 straight ATA championships in 1947.

In 1949, Gibson attempted to gain entry into the USLTA’s National Grass Court Championships at Forest Hills, the precursor of the U.S. Open. When the USLTA failed to invite her to any qualifying tournaments, Alice Marble–a four-time winner at Forest Hills–wrote a letter on Gibson’s behalf to the editor of American Lawn Tennis magazine. Marble criticized the “bigotry” of her fellow USLTA members, suggesting that if Gibson posed a challenge to current tour players, “it’s only fair that they meet this challenge on the courts.” Gibson was subsequently invited to participate in a New Jersey qualifying event, where she earned a berth at Forest Hills.

On August 28, 1950, Gibson beat Barbara Knapp 6-2, 6-2 in her first USLTA tournament match. She lost a tight match in the second round to Louise Brough, three-time defending Wimbledon champion. Gibson struggled over her first several years on tour but finally won her first major victory in 1956, at the French Open in Paris. She came into her own the following year, winning Wimbledon and the U.S. Open at the relatively advanced age of 30.

Gibson repeated at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open the next year but soon decided to retire from the amateur ranks and go pro. At the time, the pro tennis league was poorly developed, and Gibson at one point went on tour with the Harlem Globetrotters, playing tennis during halftime of their basketball games. In the early 1960s, Gibson became the first black player to compete on the women’s golf tour, though she never won a tournament. She was elected to the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1971.

Though she once brushed off comparisons to Jackie Robinson, the trailblazing black baseball player, Gibson has been credited with paving the way for African-American tennis champions such as Arthur Ashe and, more recently, Venus and Serena Williams. After a long illness, she died in 2003 at the age of 76.

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Celia Cruz Biography

Singer(1925–2003)

Celia Cruz was a Cuban-American singer, best known as one of the most popular salsa performers of all time, recording 23 gold albums. 

Celia Cruz grew up in the poor Havana neighborhood of Santos Suárez, where Cuba's diverse musical climate became a growing influence. In the 1940s, Cruz won a "La hora del té" ("Tea Time") singing contest, propelling her into a music career. While Cruz's mother encouraged her to enter other contests around Cuba, her more traditional father had other plans for her, encouraging her to become a teacher—a common occupation for Cuban women at that time.

Rising Musical Career

Cruz enrolled at the National Teachers’ College, but dropped out soon after, since her live and radio performances around were gaining acclaim. Tempering her own growing ambitions with her father’s wish for her to stay in school, she enrolled at Havana's National Conservatory of Music. However, instead of finding reasons for continuing on the academic track, one of Cruz’s professors convinced her that she should pursue a full-time singing career.

Cruz’s first recordings were made in 1948. In 1950, her singing career started its upward journey to stardom when she began singing with celebrated Cuban orchestra Sonora Matancera. Initially, there were doubts that Cruz could successfully replace the previous lead singer and that a woman could sell salsa records at all. However, Cruz helped propel the group—and Latin music in general—to new heights, and the band toured widely through Central and North America throughout the 1950s.

Commercial Success

At the time of the 1959 Communist takeover of Cuba, Sonora Matancera was touring in Mexico, and members of the band decided to leave Cuba for good, crossing into the United States instead of returning to their homeland. Cruz became a U.S. citizen in 1961, and Fidel Castro, enraged by Cruz’s defection, barred her from returning to Cuba.

Cruz remained relatively unknown in the United States beyond the Cuban exile community initially, but when she joined the Tito Puente Orchestra in the mid–1960s, she gained exposure to a wide audience. Puente had a large following across Latin America, and as the new face of the band, Cruz became a dynamic focus for the group, reaching a new fan base. On stage, Cruz enthralled audiences with her flamboyant attire and crowd engagement—traits that bolstered her 40-year singing career.

With her seemingly unfaltering vocals, Cruz continued performing live and recording albums throughout the 1970s and 1980s, and beyond. In that time, she made more than 75 records, including 23 that went gold, and won several Grammys and Latin Grammys. She also appeared in several movies, earned a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, and was awarded the American National Medal of the Arts by the National Endowment of the Arts.

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Misty Copeland Biography

Ballet Dancer(1982–)

Acclaimed ballerina Misty Copeland is the first African-American performer to be appointed as a principal dancer for American Ballet Theatre.

Born on September 10, 1982 in Kansas City, Missouri, Misty Copeland endured a tumultuous home life to find her way to dance, eventually studying under California ballet instructor Cindy Bradley. Copeland joined the studio company of American Ballet Theatre in 2000, becoming a soloist several years later and starring in an array of productions such as The Nutcracker and Firebird. An icon whose star shines beyond the world of classical dance, in late June 2015 Copeland became the first African-American performer to be appointed as an ABT principal dancer in the company's decades long history.

She was the fourth of six siblings of generally mixed ethnic heritage. Copeland’s mother Sylvia Delacerna had several successive marriages and boyfriends, with the family packing up and moving under harried conditions at times. Copeland and her siblings eventually settled in the coastal community of San Pedro in California. Delacerna's relationship and eventual marriage to her fourth husband was tumultuous: he was emotionally and physically abusive to his stepchildren and wife and would refer to them using racial slurs.

Training and Early Career

Later describing herself as an anxious child, Copeland was able to find solace in the halls of school and the world of performance, developing a love of movement and connecting with the story of Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci. Copeland would perform dance routines at home to the songs of another icon, Mariah Carey, and eventually was chosen to be the captain of her drill team at her middle school. The teacher who ran the team thought Copeland should take ballet classes at the Boys and Girls Club she already attended. Copeland eventually did so under the tutelage of Cynthia "Cindy" Bradley, who realized that the youngster was a prodigy, able to see and perform choreographed movement immediately and dance en pointe after a very short period of ballet training.

While her dancing life was blossoming, Copeland’s home life was difficult, with Delacerna leaving her husband and the family later moving into a motel. Delacerna and Bradley ultimately decided to allow the 13-year-old dancer to move in with her teacher’s family. Copeland was thus able to continue her training while also entering the public spotlight as a promising up-and-coming performer, featured at special performances such as a charity event with actress Angela Bassett. Around this time Copeland also had a lead role in the Debbie Allen production The Chocolate Nutcracker. "She's an incredibly gifted ballerina. . .She's a child who dances in her soul," Allen said of Copeland in a December 1999 issue of Los Angeles Times Magazine. "I can't imagine her doing anything else."

Historical Achievements

With a non-traditional entry into ballet, Copeland has created buzz outside of that world due to her being one of the few African-American performers seen in classical dance. In a meteoric rise, she has continually acknowledged the responsibility she feels to brown girls looking to make their way in the art form. Her trailblazing accomplishments have been recognized by a range of institutions, and in spring 2015 she was named one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential People, a rare feat for someone from the dance world.

In June 2015, Copeland became the first African-American woman to dance with ABT in the dual role of Odette and Odile in Pyotry Ilycih Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. Then on June 30 of that same year, Copeland scored a monumental achievement covered the world over, becoming the first African-American performer to be appointed an ABT principal dancer in the company's 75-year history. At a subsequent news conference, an emotional Copeland stated in tears that the announcement marked the culmination of her lifelong dream. 

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Alice Paul Biography

Activist, Civil Rights Activist, Women's Rights Activist(1885–1977)

Suffragist Alice Paul dedicated her life's work to women's rights and was a key figure in the push for the 19th Amendment.

 . Synopsis

Born on January 11, 1885, in Mt. Laurel, New Jersey, Alice Paul grew up with a Quaker background and attended Swarthmore College before living in England and pushing for women's voting rights. When she returned to America in 1910, she became a leader in the suffragist movement, eventually forming the National Woman's Party with Lucy Burns and becoming a key figure in the voices that led to the passage of the 19th Amendment. In later years she advocated for the passage of an Equal Rights Amendment as well. She died in Moorestown on July 9, 1977.

Early Life and Schooling

Alice Paul was born on January 11, 1885, in Mt. Laurel, New Jersey, attending school in nearby Moorestown. Influenced by her Quaker family, she studied at Swarthmore College in 1905 and went on to do graduate work in New York City and England.

While in London from 1906 to 1909, Paul became politically active and unafraid to use dramatic tactics in support of a cause. She joined the women's suffrage movement in Britain and was arrested on several occasions, serving time in jail and going on a hunger strike.

Activist for Women's Right to Vote

When she returned to the United States in 1910, Paul became involved in the women’s suffrage movement there as well. Driven also to change other laws that affected women, she earned a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1912.

At first, Paul was a member of the National American Woman Suffrage Association and served as the chair of its congressional committee. Out of frustration with NAWSA's policies, however, Paul left to form the more militant Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage with Lucy Burns. The group was later renamed the National Woman's Party with the goal of implementing change on a federal level.

Known for using provocative visual media to make their point, NWP members known as the "Silent Sentinels" picketed the White House under the Woodrow Wilson administration in 1917, making them the first group to take such action. Paul was jailed in October and November of that year as a result of the protests. 

Pushing for an Equal Rights Amendment

After women won the right to vote with the 19th Amendment in 1920, Paul devoted herself to working on additional empowerment measures. In 1923, she introduced the first Equal Rights Amendment in Congress and in later decades worked on a civil rights bill and fair employment practices. Although she did not live to see the ERA added to the U.S. Constitution (to date it remains unratified), she did get an equal rights affirmation included in the preamble to the United Nations charter.

Until she was debilitated by a stroke in 1974, Alice Paul continued her fight for women’s rights. She died on July 9, 1977, in Moorestown.

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Pearl Bailey Biography

Actress, Theater Actress, Film Actor/Film Actress, Film Actress, Singer, Television Actress, Journalist(1918–1990)

Pearl Bailey was a Tony Award-winning singer and actress known for her roles in works like Carmen Jones, House of Flowers, Hello, Dolly! and Porgy and Bess.

 

QUOTE

“What the world really needs is more love and less paper work.”

—Pearl Bailey

Synopsis

Born on March 29, 1918, in Newport News, Virginia, Pearl Bailey became a cabaret singer who made her Broadway debut in St. Louis Woman. She was acclaimed for her work in stage productions like House of Flowers and Hello, Dolly!, for which she won a 1968 Tony Award, and also appeared many times on film and in television variety programs, including The Ed Sullivan Show. A United Nations adviser in her later years, Bailey died on August 17, 1990, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

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Lucy Stone Biography

Activist, Women's Rights Activist, Journalist(1818–1893)

Lucy Stone was a leading activist and pioneer of the abolitionist and women's rights movements.

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QUOTES

“A wife should no more take her husband's name than he should hers. My name is my identity and must not be lost.”

—Lucy Stone

Synopsis

Born in Massachusetts in 1818, Lucy Stone dedicated her life to improving the rights of American women. She supported the Women's National Loyal League, which was founded by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony (though Stone and the two would later be at odds), and in 1866 helped found the American Equal Rights Association. She also organized and was elected president of the State Woman's Suffrage Association of New Jersey, and spent her life serving the cause. Stone died 30 years before women were finally permitted to vote (August 1920), on October 18, 1893, in Dorchester, Massachusetts.

Early Years

Influential women's rights activist and abolitionist Lucy Stone was born on August 13, 1818, in West Brookfield, Massachusetts. One of Francis Stone and Hannah Matthews's nine children, Lucy Stone was steeped early on in life the virtues of fighting against slavery from her parents, both committed abolitionists. Smart and clearly driven, Stone was also unafraid to rebel against her parents' wishes. Having watched her older brothers attend college, the 16-year-old Stone defied her parents and pursued a higher education.

In 1839, Stone attended Mount Holyoke Seminary for just one term. Four years later, she enrolled at Oberlin College in Ohio. While Oberlin touted itself as a progressive institution, the school did not offer a level playing field for women. As a result, the college denied Stone the opportunity to pursue her passion in public speaking. Undeterred, Stone, who paid her way through school, graduated in 1847 with honors, becoming the first woman from Massachusetts to earn a bachelor's degree.

Acclaimed Speaker

Under the direction of William Lloyd Garrison, whom she'd met while at Oberlin, Stone soon found work with the American Anti-Slavery Society. Her work with the organization tapped into her continued and heightened passion to eradicate slavery. It also launched her career as a public speaker.

While she was regularly heckled by opponents (she was even ex-communicated by the Congregational Church, the religion of her parents), Stone emerged as an outspoken voice in the anti-slavery movement and the women's rights cause.

Women's Rights Convention

In 1850, the pioneering Stone convened the first national Women's Rights Convention. Held in Worcester, Massachusetts, the event was hailed as a significant moment for American women, and Stone was a celebrated leader. Her speech at the convention was reprinted in newspapers nationwide.

For the next few years, Stone, who was paid well for her speeches, kept up a relentless schedule, traveling throughout North America to lecture about women's rights while continuing to hold her annual convention.

In 1868 co-founded and became president of the State Woman's Suffrage Association of New Jersey, which would later be succeeded by the League of Women Voters of New Jersey in 1920. She also launched a New England chapter of the association and had helped found the American Equal Rights Association.

Personal Life

In 1855, Stone married Henry Blackwell, a committed abolitionist who'd spent two long years trying to convince his fellow activist to marry him. Though initially taking on her husband's surname, she opted to go back to her maiden name a year after their marriage. "A wife should no more take her husband's name than he should hers," she explained in a letter to her spouse. "My name is my identity and must not be lost." At their actual wedding, both she and Henry also protested the idea via signed document that a husband has legal dominion over his wife.

The couple eventually moved to Orange, New Jersey and became the parents of a daughter, Alice Stone Blackwell.

Later Years

As with any high-profile political movement, fissures emerged. After the Civil War, Stone found herself at odds with fellow suffragists Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, both former allies who deeply opposed Stone's support for the 15th Amendment. While the amendment only guaranteed black men the right to vote, Stone backed it, reasoning that it would eventually lead to the women's vote as well. Anthony and Stanton strongly disagreed; they felt that the amendment was a half-measure, and resented what they perceived as Stone's betrayal of the women's rights movement.

In 1890, however, thanks in large part to the hard work of Stone's daughter, Alice, and Stanton's daughter, Harriot Stanton Blatch, the women's rights movement reunified through the formation of the National American Woman Suffrage Association.

While Stone did live to see the end of slavery, she died 30 years before women were finally permitted to vote (August 1920), on October 18, 1893, in Dorchester, Massachusetts. Her ashes are held at a columbarium within Boston's Forest Hill Cemetery.

 

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Sandra Day O'Connor Biography

Supreme Court Justice(1930–)

Sandra Day O'Connor was the first woman appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court. A Republican, she was considered a moderate conservative and served for 24 years.

Born in El Paso, Texas, on March 26, 1930, Sandra Day O'Connor was elected to two terms in the Arizona state senate. In 1981, Ronald Reagan nominated her to the U.S. Supreme Court. She received unanimous Senate approval, and made history as the first woman justice to serve on the nation's highest court. O'Connor was a key swing vote in many important cases, including the upholding of Roe v. Wade. She retired in 2006 after serving for 24 years.

After graduating from Stanford University in 1950 with a bachelor’s degree in economics, O’Connor attended the university’s law school and received her degree in 1952, graduating third in her class. With opportunities for female lawyers very limited at the time, O'Connor struggled to find a job and worked without pay for the county attorney of California's San Mateo region just to get her foot in the door. She soon became deputy county attorney.

From 1954-57, O'Connor moved overseas and served as a civilian lawyer for the Quartermaster Masker Center in Frankfurt, Germany. She returned home in 1958 and settled in Arizona. There she worked at a private practice before returning to public service, acting as the state's assistant attorney general from 1965-69.

Lawyer and Judge

In 1969, O'Connor received a state senate appointment by Governor Jack Williams in order to fill a vacancy. A conservative Republican, O'Connor won reelection twice. In 1974, she took on a different challenge and ran for the position of judge in the Maricopa County Superior Court, winning the race.

As a judge, Sandra Day O'Connor developed a solid reputation for being firm but just. Outside of the courtroom, she remained involved in Republican politics. In 1979, O'Connor was selected to serve on the state's court of appeals. Only two years later, President Ronald Reagan nominated her for associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. O'Connor received unanimous approval from the U.S. Senate and broke new ground for women when she was sworn in as the first female justice on the Supreme Court.

Supreme Court Justice 

As a member of the country's highest court, O'Connor was considered to be a moderate conservative, who tended to vote in line with the Republican platform, although at times broke from its ideology. O'Connor often focused on the letter of law, and voted for what she believed best fit the intentions of the U.S. Constitution. 

In 1982, she wrote the majority opinion in Mississippi University for Women v. Hogan, in which the court ruled 5-4 that a state nursing school had to admit men after traditionally having been a women's-only institution. In opposition to the Republican call to reverse the Roe v. Wade decision on abortion rights, O'Connor provided the vote needed in Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992) to uphold the court's earlier decision. In a majority opinion coauthored with Anthony Kennedy and David Souter, O'Connor broke away from the dissents penned by William Rehnquist and Antonin Scalia. In 1999, O'Connor sided with the majority opinion in the sexual harassment case Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education that ruled the school board in question was indeed responsible for protecting a fifth-grade student from unwanted advances from another student.

O'Connor was also the deciding vote on the controversial Bush v. Gore case in 2000. The ruling effectively ended the recount of votes for the contested 2000 presidential race, thereby upholding the original certification of Florida's electoral votes. George W. Bush thus went on to serve his first term as president, with O'Connor later admitting that perhaps the highest court should not have weighed in based on the circumstances of the election.

Personal Challenges and Retirement

During her time as a justice, O'Connor also faced some personal challenges. She discovered that she had breast cancer in 1988 and subsequently underwent a mastectomy. In 1994, O'Connor publicly revealed her battle with the disease in a speech delivered to the National Coalition for Cancer Survivorship. But it was her husband's declining health that eventually led the respected jurist to step down from the bench.

O'Connor retired from the court on January 31, 2006. Part of her reason for leaving was to spend more time with her spouse, John Jay O'Connor III, who suffered from Alzheimer's. The couple married in 1952 and had three sons. Her husband died in 2009.

For 24 years, Sandra Day O'Connor was a pioneering force on the Supreme Court. She'll long be remembered for acting as a sturdy guiding hand in the court's decisions during those years and for serving as a swing vote in important cases.

Life After the Supreme Court

O'Connor didn't slow down in her retirement. In 2006, she launched iCivics, an online civics education venture aimed at middle school students. As she explained to Parade magazine, "We have a complex system of government. You have to teach it to every generation." She has also served on the federal appeals court and authored several books: the judicial memoir The Majesty of the Law: Reflections of a Supreme Court Justice (2003), the children's titles Chico (2005) and Finding Susie (2009) and Out of Order: Stories From the History of the Supreme Court (2013).

O'Connor has been active on the lecture circuit as well, speaking to different groups around the country while continuing to weigh in on legal issues. In 2012, O'Connor defended current Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts for his vote to uphold President Barack Obama's healthcare law. Roberts came under fire for not voting in line with conservative views. According to the Los Angeles Times, O'Connor said that the justices were not obligated to follow the politics of the president who appointed him or her. She has also campaigned to end judicial appointment through elections, with the belief that having judges run campaigns compromises the judicial process.

Since her retirement, O'Connor has received numerous accolades. Arizona State University named its law school after the distinguished justice in 2006 and President Obama honored her with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009. She lives in Phoenix, Arizona.

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Maya Angelou

Considered to be one of the most consequential figures of the 20th century, Maya Angelou had a diverse career spanning five decades — first as a singer and dancer, then as a journalist and civil rights activist, and later as a memoirist, poet and screenwriter.

She was a Civil Rights Activist

Having traveled the world and met with Malcolm X while living in Ghana, Maya Angelou returned to the U.S. in 1964 to help the black leader in his political efforts. However, soon after she arrived stateside, Malcolm X was assassinated.

Despite his death, Angelou continued working with the Civil Rights Movement and helped fundraise for Martin Luther King, Jr. Unfortunately, the young artist found herself devastated once again, when King was murdered on her birthday in 1968. It was during this time that novelist James Baldwin encouraged Angelou to write and she began work on I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

Recalling her childhood experiences growing up in Arkansas to becoming a mother at 16, Angelou published I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings in 1969. It became an instant bestseller and stayed on the New York Times paperback bestseller list for the next two years. Nominated for a National Book Award in 1970, it is considered her most famous work. In 2011, Time magazine ranked it as one of the most influential books of modern times.

She was the first black woman to write a screenplay for a major film release

In 1972 Angelou expanded her writing and musical talents by writing and scoring Georgia, Georgia, a Swedish-American drama that would later be nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. She would go on to write for television, theatre, and would eventually reach her goal of directing a film with Down in the Delta in 1998.

She was the first female inaugural poet in U.S. presidential history

In 1993 Angelou recited her poem, "On the Pulse of Morning," for President Bill Clinton's inauguration. She became the first African-American poet and first female poet to participate in a recitation for a U.S. president's inauguration. The only inaugural poet that came before her was Robert Frost who recited "The Gift Outright" during President John F. Kennedy's ceremony in 1961.

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Laura Ingalls Wilder Biography

Author, Educator, Journalist(1867–1957)

Pioneer author Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote the autobiographical "Little House" kids' book series, the basis of the popular television show Little House on the Prairie.

Synopsis

Laura Ingalls Wilder was born on February 7, 1867, near Pepin, Wisconsin. From 1882–1885 she was a teacher in South Dakota. She married Almanzo Wilder in 1885. In 1932, she published Little House in the Big Woods, the first of her "Little House" books. Wilder finished the last book in 1943. On February 10, 1957, she died at age 90, on her farm in Mansfield, Missouri.

Early Life

Laura Ingalls Wilder was born on February 7, 1867, to Charles and Caroline Ingalls in their log cabin just outside of Pepin, Wisconsin. In her books, Wilder would later come to call the cabin "The Little House in the Big Woods." Two years after her birth, in 1869, her family moved to Kansas, which would become the setting for her book Little House on the Prairie. She was one of five children. She had an older sister named Mary; two younger sisters, Carrie and Grace; and a younger brother named Charles, who died at nine months old.

Wilder described her early years as "full of sunshine and shadow." When she was growing up, she and her pioneer family repeatedly moved from one Midwestern town to the next. In 1874, they moved from Wisconsin to Walnut Grove, Minnesota. Although the Ingalls family initially stayed in Walnut Grove for only two years before a failed crop forced them to move to Burr Oak, Iowa, Walnut Grove became the setting of Little House on the Prairie (1974–1982), a television show based on Laura Wilder's life.

In the autumn of 1878, the Ingalls family returned to Walnut Grove. In 1879, they moved yet again, becoming homesteaders in the Dakota Territory, and eventually settling in De Smet, South Dakota.

Teaching Career

Because they had moved so often, Wilder and her siblings mainly taught themselves and each other. They attended local schools whenever they could. Her decision to become a teacher herself was largely an economic one. Her family needed the additional income, especially with Wilder's older sister Mary away at a school for the blind. In 1882, Wilder passed the test to obtain her teaching certificate.

Just 15 years old, she signed on to teach at a one-room country schoolhouse 12 miles from her parents' home, the first of several teaching jobs. During her time teaching at Bouchie School, her parents often sent a family friend named Almanzo Wilder to pick her up and bring her home for weekend visits. 

Marriage and Children

Over the course of their wagon rides home, Laura and Almanzo fell in love. On August 25, 1885, the two were married at a congregational church in South Dakota. Afterward, Laura quit teaching to raise children and help Almanzo work the farm. In the winter of 1886, Laura gave birth to a daughter, Rose. In August of 1889 she had a son who tragically died within a month of his birth. Not long after, Almanzo contracted diphtheria and was partially paralyzed. To make matters worse, in 1890, the Wilders' home burned to the ground.

ce to place, in 1894 the Wilders bought a 200-acre farm in the Ozarks of Mansfield, Missouri. On Rocky Ridge Farm, as they came to call it, the Wilders built a farmhouse, raised livestock and did all their own farm work.

The 'Little House' Series

In the 1910s Wilder's daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, by then grown up and a reporter for the San Francisco Bulletin, encouraged her mother to write about her childhood. In the 1920s, Wilder's first attempt at writing an autobiography, called Pioneer Girl, was uniformly rejected by publishers. Determined to succeed, Wilder spent the next several years reworking her writing, including switching the title and changing the story to be told from the third-person perspective.

In 1932, Laura Wilder published Little House in the Big Woods, the first book in what would become an autobiographical series of children's books, collectively called the "Little House" books. Just as Little House in the Big Woods recounts her life in Pepin, Wisconsin, each of her books focuses on one of the more memorable places she lived. With Wilder and daughter Rose working together on the manuscripts, other books in the "Little House" series include Little House on the Prairie, Farmer Boy, On the Banks of Plum Creek, By the Shores of Silver Lake, The Long Winter, Little Town on the Prairie and These Happy Golden Years. Wilder completed the last book in the "Little House" series in 1943, when she was 76 years old.

Later Life and Death

In 1949, when Almanzo died, Wilder stayed on at Rocky Ridge, reading and responding to her readers' fan mail. On February 10, 1957, she died on the farm in Mansfield, Missouri. Following Wilder's death, Rose edited and published several posthumous works based on her mother's diary and incomplete manuscripts.

Little House on the Prairie, a television show based on Laura Wilder's life, aired in 1974 and ran until 1982. Children and adults across the country followed Laura's tragedies and triumphs, watching as actress Melissa Gilbert, in her spunky yet earnest portrayal, grew up on the screen. The show generated further interest in Wilder, and helped spawn new generations of "Little House" readers.

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Josephine Baker Biography

Activist, Civil Rights Activist, Dancer, Singer(1906–1975)

Josephine Baker was a dancer and singer who became wildly popular in France during the 1920s. She also devoted much of her life to fighting racism.

Synopsis

Born Freda Josephine McDonald on June 3, 1906, in St. Louis, Missouri, Josephine Baker spent her youth in poverty before learning to dance and finding success on Broadway. In the 1920s she moved to France and soon became one of Europe's most popular and highest-paid performers. She worked for the French Resistance during World War II, and during the 1950s and '60s devoted herself to fighting segregation and racism in the United States. After beginning her comeback to the stage in 1973, Josephine Baker died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 12, 1975, and was buried with military honors.

Early Life

Josephine Baker was born Freda Josephine McDonald on June 3, 1906, in St. Louis, Missouri. Her mother, Carrie McDonald, was a washerwoman who had given up her dreams of becoming a music-hall dancer. Her father, Eddie Carson, was a vaudeville drummer. He abandoned Carrie and Josephine shortly after her birth. Carrie remarried soon thereafter and would have several more children in the coming years.

To help support her growing family, at age 8 Josephine cleaned houses and babysat for wealthy white families, often being poorly treated. She briefly returned to school two years later before running away from home at age 13 and finding work as a waitress at a club. While working there, she married a man named Willie Wells, from whom she divorced only weeks later.

The Path to Paris

It was also around this time that Josephine first took up dancing, honing her skills both in clubs and in street performances, and by 1919 she was touring the United States with the Jones Family Band and the Dixie Steppers performing comedic skits. In 1921, Josephine married a man named Willie Baker, whose name she would keep for the rest of her life despite their divorce years later. In 1923, Baker landed a role in the musical Shuffle Along as a member of the chorus, and the comic touch that she brought to the part made her popular with audiences. Looking to parlay these early successes, Baker moved to New York City and was soon performing in Chocolate Dandies and, along with Ethel Waters, in the floor show of the Plantation Club, where again she quickly became a crowd favorite.

In 1925, at the peak of France’s obsession with American jazz and all things exotic, Baker traveled to Paris to perform in La Revue Nègre at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées. She made an immediate impression on French audiences when, with dance partner Joe Alex, she performed the Danse Sauvage, in which she wore only a feather skirt.

However, it was the following year, at the Folies Bergère music hall, one of the most popular of the era, that Baker’s career would reach a major turning point. In a performance called La Folie du Jour, Baker danced wearing little more than a skirt made of 16 bananas. The show was wildly popular with Parisian audiences and Baker was soon among the most popular and highest-paid performers in Europe, having the admiration of cultural figures like Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway and E. E. Cummings and earning herself nicknames like “Black Venus” and “Black Pearl.” She also received more than 1,000 marriage proposals.

Capitalizing on this success, Baker sang professionally for the first time in 1930, and several years later landed film roles as a singer in Zou-Zou and Princesse Tam-Tam. The money she earned from her performances soon allowed her to purchase an estate in Castelnaud-Fayrac, in the southwest of France. She named the estate Les Milandes, and soon paid to move her family there from St. Louis.

Racism and Resistance

In 1936, riding the wave of popularity she was enjoying in France, Baker returned to the United States to perform in the Ziegfield Follies, hoping to establish herself as a performer in her home country as well. However, she was met with a generally hostile, racist reaction and quickly returned to France, crestfallen at her mistreatment. Upon her return, Baker married French industrialist Jean Lion and obtained citizenship from the country that had embraced her as one of its own.

When World War II erupted later that year, Baker worked for the Red Cross during the occupation of France. As a member of the Free French forces she also entertained troops in both Africa and the Middle East. Perhaps most importantly, however, Baker did work for the French Resistance, at times smuggling messages hidden in her sheet music and even in her underwear. For these efforts, at the war’s end, Baker was awarded both the Croix de Guerre and the Legion of Honour with the rosette of the Resistance, two of France’s highest military honors.

Following the war, Baker spent most of her time at Les Milandes with her family. In 1947, she married French orchestra leader Jo Bouillon, and beginning in 1950 began to adopt babies from around the world. She adopted 12 children in all, creating what she referred to as her “rainbow tribe” and her “experiment in brotherhood.” She often invited people to the estate to see these children, to demonstrate that people of different races could in fact live together harmoniously.

Return to the U.S.

During the 1950s, Baker frequently returned to the United States to lend her support to the Civil Rights Movement, participating in demonstrations and boycotting segregated clubs and concert venues. In 1963, Baker participated, alongside Martin Luther King Jr., in the March on Washington, and was among the many notable speakers that day. In honor of her efforts, the NAACP eventually named May 20th “Josephine Baker Day.”

After decades of rejection by her countrymen and a lifetime spent dealing with racism, in 1973 Baker performed at Carnegie Hall in New York and was greeted with a standing ovation. She was so moved by her reception that she wept openly before her audience. The show was a huge success and marked Baker’s comeback to the stage.

Curtain Call

In April 1975, Josephine Baker performed at the Bobino Theater in Paris, in the first of a series of performances celebrating the 50th anniversary of her Paris debut. Numerous celebrities were in attendance, including Sophia Loren and Princess Grace of Monaco, who had been a dear friend to Baker for years. Just days later, on April 12, 1975, Baker died in her sleep of a cerebral hemorrhage. She was 69.

On the day of her funeral, more than 20,000 people lined the streets of Paris to witness the procession, and the French government honored her with a 21-gun salute, making Baker the first American woman in history to be buried in France with military honors.