Tag Archives | playwright

Zora Neale Hurston – January 28th in African American History

January 28, 1960 Zora Neale Hurston, author and playwright, died. Hurston was born January 7, 1891 in Notasulga, Alabama but raised in Eatonville, Florida, the first all-black town to be incorporated in the United States. Hurston described the experience of growing up in Eatonville in her 1928 essay “How It Feels to Be Colored Me.” […]

Read full story · Comments { 0 }
Noble Sissle

Noble Sissle – December 17th in African American History

December 17, 1975 Noble Sissle, composer, lyricist, bandleader, and playwright, died. Sissle was born July 10, 1889 in Indianapolis, Indiana. At an early age, he started singing in the church choir and as a teenager toured the Midwest as part of a gospel quartet. In 1915, he met Eubie Blake and they formed a vaudeville […]

Read full story · Comments { 0 }
Charles Henry Fuller, Jr.

March 5th in African American History – Charles Henry Fuller, Jr.

March 5, 1939 Charles Henry Fuller, Jr., playwright and novelist, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Fuller attended Villanova University before serving in the United States Army from 1959 to 1962. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree from La Salle College in 1967 and was a co-founder of the Afro-American Arts Theater in Philadelphia that […]

Read full story · Comments { 0 }
lorraine hansberry

January 12th in African American History – Lorraine Hansberry

January 12, 1965 Lorraine Hansberry, African-American playwright and author, died. Hansberry was born May 19, 1930 in Chicago, Illinois. She moved to New York City in 1950 to pursue a career as a writer. In 1959, her play, “A Raisin in the Sun” debuted on Broadway. It was the first play written by an African […]

Read full story · Comments { 0 }
Ossie Davis

December 18th in African American History – Raiford Chatman “Ossie” Davis

December 18, 1917 Raiford Chatman “Ossie” Davis, actor, director, playwright and social activist, was born in Cogdell, Georgia. Davis began his acting career in 1939 with the Rose McClendon Players in Harlem and made his film debut in 1950 in “No Way Out.” Over the next 55 years, he appeared in almost 50 movies, including […]

Read full story · Comments { 0 }
James Arthur Baldwin

November 30th in African American History – James Arthur Baldwin

November 30, 1987 James Arthur Baldwin, novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and civil rights activist, died. Baldwin was born August 2, 1924 in Harlem, New York. When he was 17, Baldwin began to write short stories, essays, and book reviews, many of which were later collected in “Notes of a Native Son” (1955). In 1948, disillusioned […]

Read full story · Comments { 0 }
George Costello Wolfe

September 23rd in African American History – George Costello Wolfe

September 23, 1954 George Costello Wolfe, playwright and director of theater and films, was born in Frankfort, Kentucky. Wolfe earned a Bachelor of Arts in Theater from Pomona College and then taught for several years in Los Angeles and New York where he earned a Masters of Fine Arts from New York University in 1983. […]

Read full story · Comments { 0 }