Nora Holt was an important figure in the history of Black music in Chicago in the 1930s and was a noted musician, composer, and renowned singer and performer during the Harlem Renaissance in the 1940s. While employed as a music critic for the Chicago Defender … Read MoreNora Holt (1885–1974)
Richard Bruce Nugent (also Bruce Nugent), artist, writer, actor, dancer, dilettante, and bohemian of 1920s Harlem, was born to middle class Washington, D.C. socialites Richard Henry Nugent and Pauline Minerva Bruce Nugent. His father was a Pullman porter; his mother a pianist. Nugent attended Washington, … Read MoreRichard Bruce Nugent (1906-1987)
In the article below independent historian Jeffrey Perry discusses his 2008 book on early 20th Century Harlem activist Hubert Harrison. Hubert Harrison (1883-1927) is one of the truly important figures of early twentieth-century America. A brilliant writer, orator, educator, critic, and political activist, he was … Read MoreHubert Harrison: The Voice of Early 20th Century Harlem Radicalism
Ellsworth Raymond “Bumpy” Johnson was an American gangster in Harlem, New York in the 20th century. He has been the subject or character of a number of Hollywood films including The Cotton Club, Hoodlum, and most recently, American Gangster. Johnson was originally from Charleston, South … Read MoreEllsworth “Bumpy” Johnson (1906-1968)
Wallace Thurman was born in Salt Lake City, Utah on August 16, 1902 to Beulah and Oscar Thurman. He was reared by his maternal grandmother, Emma Jackson, who was among the founders of Calvary Baptist Missionary Church—the first Black church in Utah. Young Thurman lived … Read MoreWallace Thurman (1902-1934)
Harlem Renaissance writer Festus Claudius McKay was born on September 15, 1889, in Sunny Ville, in the Clarendon Hills of Jamaica, to peasant farmers Hannah Ann Elizabeth Edwards and Thomas Frank McKay. Young Claude was tutored by his elder schoolmaster brother, Uriah Theodore McKay, who introduced … Read MoreClaude McKay (1889-1948)
