Notes On Marian Anderson

Posted: 7/21/2014; updated: 8/2/2014

For more information on this celebrated African-American opera singer please see Wikipedia article.

Some Notes

1. In April of 1939, the First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and her husband helped that this singer was given an opportunity to sing in one of the earliest and then largest open air concerts in Washington, DC at the Lincoln Memorial. She was denied to sing at Constitution Hall.
2. In 1942, Ms. Anderson christened the Navy Liberty Ship Booker T. Washington (By the way this ship was commandeered by an African-American Captain and the crew was integrated. Not least it was named after this great African-American.)
3. She was the first African-American singer to perform at the Metropolitan Opera in New York city in 1955
4. She apparently was several times invited to stay at Albert Einstein’s house in New Jersey (Source). Einstein considered racism America’s worst disease.

Thus, long before the civil rights struggle of the 1960s (I call it the II. American Civil War on southern states, see my blog post), things were dramatically improving for black Americans. I bet, there are lots more examples out there that are earlier or even better than hers.