Black bi/lesbian women (part 2)
Day 11 - Frances E.W. Harper (1825-1911)
Harper published her first book of poetry at age 20 and her first novel at the age of 67. She chaired the Pennsylvania Abolition Society, helped slaves escape through the Underground Railroad, and spoke all over the country with the American Anti-Slavery Society. She helped found the National Association of Colored Women in 1894 and published in so many periodicals that she became known as the “mother of African-American journalism.” She is listed in Lesbian Lists as an “early Black Lesbian and Bisexual Writer.”
Day 12 - Edmonia “Wildfire” Lewis (1844-1907)
This African-Haitian-Ojibwe Native American sculptor was born in New York and began studying art at Oberlin in Ohio, one of the first universities to accept women and non-white people, and later began sculpting in Boston. She showed her work internationally and spent most of her career in Rome. The National Gay History Project notes that “she is considered one of a few African-American artists to develop a fan base that crossed racial, ethnic and national boundaries — and the first to develop a reputation as an acclaimed sculptor, which would later give her access to circles that generally excluded people of color and women.”
Day 13 - Alice Dunbar Nelson (1875-1935)
Nelson, who allegedly separated from her first husband, poet Paul Dunbar, in 1902 because he was “disturbed” by her lesbian affairs, was an influential writer and journalist active in efforts to promote African-American and women’s rights. She was a prominent figure in the Harlem Renaissance.
Day 14 - Angelina Weld Grimké (1880-1958)
Harlem Renaissance writer Grimké, who was biracial (her father was the second African-American to graduate from Harvard Law), was one of the first African-American women to have a play performed publicly. Of that play, The NAACP said, “This is the first attempt to use the stage for race propaganda in order to enlighten the American people relating to the lamentable condition of ten millions of Colored citizens in this free republic.” At 16, she wrote a letter to her female friend Mamie Burrile in which she declared, “I know you are too young now to become my wife, but I hope, darling, that in a few years you will come to me and be my love, my wife!” Modern literary critics who have analyzed Grimké’s work have found “strong evidence” that she was lesbian or bisexual.
Day 16 - Alberta Hunter (1895-1984)
This critically acclaimed jazz and blues recording artist started out at the prestigious Dreamland ballroom in Chicago, toured Europe, appeared in musicals in London and New York, recorded prolifically and eventually took up nursing in the ’50s and ’60s, only to return to her singing career in the ’70s, eventually touring South America and Europe, writing for film soundtracks and making television appearances. Throughout her career, Hunter kept her lesbian relationships a secret.
Day 15 - Georgia Douglas Johnson (1880-1966)
Another prominent figure in the flourishing Harlem Renaissance, Johnson grew up in Atlanta, the daughter of an African and Native American mother and an African-American and English father. In addition to writing poems and plays, she was an anti-lynching activist and hosted weekly Salons with other friends associated with the Harlem Renaissance, like Lanston Hughes and Angelina Weld Grimke. The book Lesbian Lists notes that “although her letters reveal love relationships with women, she is best known in the heterosexual world for her affair with W.E.B. DuBois.”
Day 17 - Lucille Bogan (1897-1948)
Another early Blues Singer, music critic Ernest Borneman declared Bogan, Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith “the big three of the blues.” She’s also cited as a “dirty blues musician” for her songs about prostitution, sex and alcohol.
Day 18 - Carmen Mercedes McRae (1920-1994)
Another enormously influential jazz vocalist, she is remembered for her “iconic interpretations of song lyrics” and “behind-the-beat phrasing.” She was friends with and influenced by Billie Holiday, was nominated for multiple Grammy Awards, appeared in movies and on television, and all told spent fifty years touring the world and recording albums. She believed sexuality was fluid, and was often seen in public with “female companions,” having had experiences with both men and women but resisting any official label.
Day 19 - Ethel Waters (1896-1977)
Lesbian legend Ethel Waters was the second African-American to be nominated for an Academy award and the first African-American woman to be nominated for an Emmy Award. She’s also well-known for her music — the vocalist started out singing the blues and would go on to perform on Broadway and even do pop music. Despite the stigma against the behavior, Ethel Waters even lived with her girlfriend Ethel Williams at some point, which according to Ms. Magazine, “Waters managed to keep out of all 20th century biographies about her.
Day 20 - Ruby Dandridge (1900-1987)
In addition to being the mother of the legendary actress Dorothy Dandridge, bisexual actress Ruby Dandridge was a prominent radio actress, best known for her role on Amos ‘n Andy. Her “companion” Geneva Williams lived with The Dandridges after Ruby and her husband Cyril divorced.
Black bi/lesbian women
Day 1 - Gertrude “Ma” Rainey (1886-1939)
Ma Rainey was the first Vaudeville entertainer to incorporate the blues into her performances, which led to her to – perhaps justifiably – become known as the “Mother of the Blues.” Although she was married, Rainey was known to take women as lovers, and her song “Prove It on Me Blues” directly references her preference for male attire and female companionship. Rainey often found herself in trouble with the police for her lesbian behavior, including an incident in 1925 when she was arrested for taking part in an orgy at home involving women in her chorus. Bessie Smith bailed her out of jail.
Day 2 - Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)
Zora Neale Hurston was an American folklorist, anthropologist, and author during the Harlem Renaissance. During her lifetime, she published four novels and more than 50 short stories, plays and essays. She is perhaps best known for her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, published in 1937. Today, nearly every black woman writer of significance – including Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, and Alice Walker – acknowledges Hurston as a key influence. Although she was never public about her sexuality, the book Wrapped in Rainbows, the first biography of Zora Neale Hurston in more than 25 years, explores her deep friendships with luminaries such as Langston Hughes, her sexuality and short-lived marriages, and her mysterious relationship with vodou.
Day 3 - Bessie Smith (1894-1937)
Widely referred to as The Empress of the Blues, Bessie Smith is considered one of the most popular female blues singers of the 1920s and 1930s and is credited, along with Louis Armstrong, as a major influence on jazz vocalists to this day. Bessie Smith began her professional career in 1912 by singing with Ma Rainey and subsequently performed in various touring minstrel shows and cabarets. As a solo artist, Smith was an integral part of Columbia’s Race Records, and her albums each sold 20,000 copies or more. Although married to a man named Jack Gee, Smith had an ongoing affair with a chorus girl named Lillian Simpson.
Day 4 - Mabel Hampton (1902–1989)
Mabel Hampton was a dancer during the Harlem Renaissance and later became an LGBT historian, philanthropist and activist. She met her partner, Lillian Foster, in 1932 and the two stayed together until Foster’s death in 1978. Hampton marched in the first National Gay and Lesbian March on Washington, and she appeared in the films Silent Pioneers and Before Stonewall. In 1984, Hampton spoke at New York City’s Lesbian and Gay Pride Parade. Hampton’s collection of memorabilia, ephemera, letters and other records documenting her history are housed at the Lesbian Herstory Archives and provide a window into the lives of black women and lesbians during the Harlem Renaissance.
Day 5 - Josephine Baker (1906–1975)
Josephine Baker was the 20th century’s “first black sex symbol.” An American dancer, singer and actress, Baker renounced her American citizenship in 1937 to become French. Despite the fact she was based in Europe, she participated in the American Civil Rights Movement in her own way. She adopted adopting 12 multi-ethnic orphans (long before Angelina Jolie) whom she called the “Rainbow Tribe,” she refused to perform for segregated audiences (which helped to force the integration of performance venues in the United States) and she was the only woman invited to speak at the March on Washington with Martin Luther King, Jr. Although she was married four times, her biographers have since confirmed her multiple affairs with women, including Mexican artist Frida Kahlo.
Day 6 - Gladys Bentley (1907-1960)
Gladys Bentley was an imposing figure. She was a 250-pound, masculine, dark-skinned, deep-voiced jazz singer who performed all night long at Harlem’s notorious gay speakeasies during the Harlem Renaissance while wearing a white tuxedo and top hat. Bentley was notorious for inventing obscene lyrics to popular songs, performing with a chorus line of drag queens behind her piano, and flirting with women in her audience from the stage. Unlike many in her day, she lived her life openly as a lesbian and claimed to have married a white woman in Atlantic City. An article in Ebony magazine quoted her as saying, “It seems I was born different. At least, I always thought so …. From the time I can remember anything, even as I was toddling, I never wanted a man to touch me.”
Day 7 - Lorraine Hansberry (1930–1965)
Lorraine Hansberry was an African-American playwright and author. Her best known work, A Raisin in the Sun, was inspired by her family’s own battle against racial bias in Chicago. Hansberry explored controversial themes in her writings in addition to racism in America, including abortion, discrimination, and the politics of Africa. In 1957 she joined the lesbian organization Daughters of Bilitis and contributed letters to their magazine, The Ladder, that addressed feminism and homophobia. While she addressed her lesbian identity in the articles she wrote for the magazine, she wrote under the initials L.H. for fear of being discovered as a black lesbian.
Day 8 - Audre Lorde (1934–1992)
In her own words, Audre Lorde was a “black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet.” Lorde began writing poetry at age 12 and published her first poem in Seventeen magazine at age 15. She helped found Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, the world’s first publisher run by women of color, in 1980. Her poetry was published regularly throughout her life and she served as the State Poet of New York from 1991 to 1992. Lorde explored issues of class, race, age, gender and – after a series of cancer diagnoses — health, as being fundamental to the female experience. She died of liver cancer in 1992.
Day 9 - Barbara Jordan (1936–1996)
Representative Barbara Jordan (D-Texas) was the first African-American woman elected to Congress from a southern state. In 1976, she delivered the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention, marking the first time an African-American woman had ever done so. Her speech has since been ranked as one of the top 100 American Speeches of the 20th century and is considered by some historians to be among the best convention keynote speeches in modern history. Although Jordan never publicly acknowledged her sexual orientation, her Houston Chronicle obituary mentioned her longtime companion of more than 20 years, Nancy Earl. Her legacy inspired the Jordan Rustin Coalition, a Los Angeles-based organization dedicated to the empowerment of Black LGBT people and families.
Day 10 - June Jordan (1936-2002)
June Jordan was one of the most widely-published and highly-acclaimed African-American writers of her generation. A poet, playwright, speaker, teacher, journalist and essayist Jordan was also known for her fierce commitment to human rights political activism. Jordan said of her bisexuality, “bisexuality means I am free and I am as likely to want to love a woman as I am likely to want to love a man, and what about that? Isn’t that what freedom implies?” Her influential voice defined the cutting edge of both American poetry and politics during the Civil Rights Movement. She published 27 before her death from breast cancer in 2002 at the age of 65. Three more of her books have been published posthumously.
Black bi/lesbian women (part 2)
Day 11 - Frances E.W. Harper (1825-1911)
Harper published her first book of poetry at age 20 and her first novel at the age of 67. She chaired the Pennsylvania Abolition Society, helped slaves escape through the Underground Railroad, and spoke all over the country with the American Anti-Slavery Society. She helped found the National Association of Colored Women in 1894 and published in so many periodicals that she became known as the “mother of African-American journalism.” She is listed in Lesbian Lists as an “early Black Lesbian and Bisexual Writer.”
Day 12 - Edmonia “Wildfire” Lewis (1844-1907)
This African-Haitian-Ojibwe Native American sculptor was born in New York and began studying art at Oberlin in Ohio, one of the first universities to accept women and non-white people, and later began sculpting in Boston. She showed her work internationally and spent most of her career in Rome. The National Gay History Project notes that “she is considered one of a few African-American artists to develop a fan base that crossed racial, ethnic and national boundaries — and the first to develop a reputation as an acclaimed sculptor, which would later give her access to circles that generally excluded people of color and women.”
Day 13 - Alice Dunbar Nelson (1875-1935)
Nelson, who allegedly separated from her first husband, poet Paul Dunbar, in 1902 because he was “disturbed” by her lesbian affairs, was an influential writer and journalist active in efforts to promote African-American and women’s rights. She was a prominent figure in the Harlem Renaissance.
Day 14 - Angelina Weld Grimké (1880-1958)
Harlem Renaissance writer Grimké, who was biracial (her father was the second African-American to graduate from Harvard Law), was one of the first African-American women to have a play performed publicly. Of that play, The NAACP said, “This is the first attempt to use the stage for race propaganda in order to enlighten the American people relating to the lamentable condition of ten millions of Colored citizens in this free republic.” At 16, she wrote a letter to her female friend Mamie Burrile in which she declared, “I know you are too young now to become my wife, but I hope, darling, that in a few years you will come to me and be my love, my wife!” Modern literary critics who have analyzed Grimké’s work have found “strong evidence” that she was lesbian or bisexual.
Day 16 - Alberta Hunter (1895-1984)
This critically acclaimed jazz and blues recording artist started out at the prestigious Dreamland ballroom in Chicago, toured Europe, appeared in musicals in London and New York, recorded prolifically and eventually took up nursing in the ’50s and ’60s, only to return to her singing career in the ’70s, eventually touring South America and Europe, writing for film soundtracks and making television appearances. Throughout her career, Hunter kept her lesbian relationships a secret.
Day 15 - Georgia Douglas Johnson (1880-1966)
Another prominent figure in the flourishing Harlem Renaissance, Johnson grew up in Atlanta, the daughter of an African and Native American mother and an African-American and English father. In addition to writing poems and plays, she was an anti-lynching activist and hosted weekly Salons with other friends associated with the Harlem Renaissance, like Lanston Hughes and Angelina Weld Grimke. The book Lesbian Lists notes that “although her letters reveal love relationships with women, she is best known in the heterosexual world for her affair with W.E.B. DuBois.”
Day 17 - Lucille Bogan (1897-1948)
Another early Blues Singer, music critic Ernest Borneman declared Bogan, Ma Rainey and Bessie Smith “the big three of the blues.” She’s also cited as a “dirty blues musician” for her songs about prostitution, sex and alcohol.
Day 18 - Carmen Mercedes McRae (1920-1994)
Another enormously influential jazz vocalist, she is remembered for her “iconic interpretations of song lyrics” and “behind-the-beat phrasing.” She was friends with and influenced by Billie Holiday, was nominated for multiple Grammy Awards, appeared in movies and on television, and all told spent fifty years touring the world and recording albums. She believed sexuality was fluid, and was often seen in public with “female companions,” having had experiences with both men and women but resisting any official label.
Day 19 - Ethel Waters (1896-1977)
Lesbian legend Ethel Waters was the second African-American to be nominated for an Academy award and the first African-American woman to be nominated for an Emmy Award. She’s also well-known for her music — the vocalist started out singing the blues and would go on to perform on Broadway and even do pop music. Despite the stigma against the behavior, Ethel Waters even lived with her girlfriend Ethel Williams at some point, which according to Ms. Magazine, “Waters managed to keep out of all 20th century biographies about her.
Day 20 - Ruby Dandridge (1900-1987)
In addition to being the mother of the legendary actress Dorothy Dandridge, bisexual actress Ruby Dandridge was a prominent radio actress, best known for her role on Amos ‘n Andy. Her “companion” Geneva Williams lived with The Dandridges after Ruby and her husband Cyril divorced.
Black bi/lesbian women
Day 1 - Gertrude “Ma” Rainey (1886-1939)
Ma Rainey was the first Vaudeville entertainer to incorporate the blues into her performances, which led to her to – perhaps justifiably – become known as the “Mother of the Blues.” Although she was married, Rainey was known to take women as lovers, and her song “Prove It on Me Blues” directly references her preference for male attire and female companionship. Rainey often found herself in trouble with the police for her lesbian behavior, including an incident in 1925 when she was arrested for taking part in an orgy at home involving women in her chorus. Bessie Smith bailed her out of jail.
Day 2 - Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)
Zora Neale Hurston was an American folklorist, anthropologist, and author during the Harlem Renaissance. During her lifetime, she published four novels and more than 50 short stories, plays and essays. She is perhaps best known for her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, published in 1937. Today, nearly every black woman writer of significance – including Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, and Alice Walker – acknowledges Hurston as a key influence. Although she was never public about her sexuality, the book Wrapped in Rainbows, the first biography of Zora Neale Hurston in more than 25 years, explores her deep friendships with luminaries such as Langston Hughes, her sexuality and short-lived marriages, and her mysterious relationship with vodou.
Day 3 - Bessie Smith (1894-1937)
Widely referred to as The Empress of the Blues, Bessie Smith is considered one of the most popular female blues singers of the 1920s and 1930s and is credited, along with Louis Armstrong, as a major influence on jazz vocalists to this day. Bessie Smith began her professional career in 1912 by singing with Ma Rainey and subsequently performed in various touring minstrel shows and cabarets. As a solo artist, Smith was an integral part of Columbia’s Race Records, and her albums each sold 20,000 copies or more. Although married to a man named Jack Gee, Smith had an ongoing affair with a chorus girl named Lillian Simpson.
Day 4 - Mabel Hampton (1902–1989)
Mabel Hampton was a dancer during the Harlem Renaissance and later became an LGBT historian, philanthropist and activist. She met her partner, Lillian Foster, in 1932 and the two stayed together until Foster’s death in 1978. Hampton marched in the first National Gay and Lesbian March on Washington, and she appeared in the films Silent Pioneers and Before Stonewall. In 1984, Hampton spoke at New York City’s Lesbian and Gay Pride Parade. Hampton’s collection of memorabilia, ephemera, letters and other records documenting her history are housed at the Lesbian Herstory Archives and provide a window into the lives of black women and lesbians during the Harlem Renaissance.
Day 5 - Josephine Baker (1906–1975)
Josephine Baker was the 20th century’s “first black sex symbol.” An American dancer, singer and actress, Baker renounced her American citizenship in 1937 to become French. Despite the fact she was based in Europe, she participated in the American Civil Rights Movement in her own way. She adopted adopting 12 multi-ethnic orphans (long before Angelina Jolie) whom she called the “Rainbow Tribe,” she refused to perform for segregated audiences (which helped to force the integration of performance venues in the United States) and she was the only woman invited to speak at the March on Washington with Martin Luther King, Jr. Although she was married four times, her biographers have since confirmed her multiple affairs with women, including Mexican artist Frida Kahlo.
Day 6 - Gladys Bentley (1907-1960)
Gladys Bentley was an imposing figure. She was a 250-pound, masculine, dark-skinned, deep-voiced jazz singer who performed all night long at Harlem’s notorious gay speakeasies during the Harlem Renaissance while wearing a white tuxedo and top hat. Bentley was notorious for inventing obscene lyrics to popular songs, performing with a chorus line of drag queens behind her piano, and flirting with women in her audience from the stage. Unlike many in her day, she lived her life openly as a lesbian and claimed to have married a white woman in Atlantic City. An article in Ebony magazine quoted her as saying, “It seems I was born different. At least, I always thought so …. From the time I can remember anything, even as I was toddling, I never wanted a man to touch me.”
Day 7 - Lorraine Hansberry (1930–1965)
Lorraine Hansberry was an African-American playwright and author. Her best known work, A Raisin in the Sun, was inspired by her family’s own battle against racial bias in Chicago. Hansberry explored controversial themes in her writings in addition to racism in America, including abortion, discrimination, and the politics of Africa. In 1957 she joined the lesbian organization Daughters of Bilitis and contributed letters to their magazine, The Ladder, that addressed feminism and homophobia. While she addressed her lesbian identity in the articles she wrote for the magazine, she wrote under the initials L.H. for fear of being discovered as a black lesbian.
Day 8 - Audre Lorde (1934–1992)
In her own words, Audre Lorde was a “black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet.” Lorde began writing poetry at age 12 and published her first poem in Seventeen magazine at age 15. She helped found Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, the world’s first publisher run by women of color, in 1980. Her poetry was published regularly throughout her life and she served as the State Poet of New York from 1991 to 1992. Lorde explored issues of class, race, age, gender and – after a series of cancer diagnoses — health, as being fundamental to the female experience. She died of liver cancer in 1992.
Day 9 - Barbara Jordan (1936–1996)
Representative Barbara Jordan (D-Texas) was the first African-American woman elected to Congress from a southern state. In 1976, she delivered the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention, marking the first time an African-American woman had ever done so. Her speech has since been ranked as one of the top 100 American Speeches of the 20th century and is considered by some historians to be among the best convention keynote speeches in modern history. Although Jordan never publicly acknowledged her sexual orientation, her Houston Chronicle obituary mentioned her longtime companion of more than 20 years, Nancy Earl. Her legacy inspired the Jordan Rustin Coalition, a Los Angeles-based organization dedicated to the empowerment of Black LGBT people and families.
Day 10 - June Jordan (1936-2002)
June Jordan was one of the most widely-published and highly-acclaimed African-American writers of her generation. A poet, playwright, speaker, teacher, journalist and essayist Jordan was also known for her fierce commitment to human rights political activism. Jordan said of her bisexuality, “bisexuality means I am free and I am as likely to want to love a woman as I am likely to want to love a man, and what about that? Isn’t that what freedom implies?” Her influential voice defined the cutting edge of both American poetry and politics during the Civil Rights Movement. She published 27 before her death from breast cancer in 2002 at the age of 65. Three more of her books have been published posthumously.