Malcolm X was born Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska 88 years ago today in 1925. He would later change his name to El-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz. In this photo from March 1964, he is shown with Muhammad Ali outside of the Trans-Lux Newsreel Theater in New York City after a screening of a film about Mr. Ali’s title fight with Sonny Liston. Photo: AP/Corbis.
ICONS: Sammy Davis, Jr., Harry Belafonte and Sidney Poitier in an outtake from their February 4, 1966 LIFE magazine cover. Thank you Reggie Hudlin! Photo: Philippe Halsman/Magnum Photos.
Jackie Robinson and Joe Louis compare notes, and the tools of their respective trades, on June 14, 1946 during Mr. Robinson’s visit to Mr. Louis’s training camp in Pompton Lake, New Jersey. It was 66 years ago today, on April 15, 1947, that Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in Major League Baseball to play with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Photo: Bettman/Corbis.
Bill Cosby enjoying a cigar, circa 1960s. According to Cigar Aficianado magazine, his favorite cigar is an Ashton Maduro No. 60.
Actor Graham Brown, pictured on one of his actor composite photos from the 1960s. Born Robert Elwood Brown in Harlem on October 24, 1924, Mr. Brown was an actor whose career spanned more than five decades. A World War II veteran, he began acting in Army shows before enrolling in college at Howard University, where he was a member of the Howard University Players theater group and graduated in 1949. Over the last few months, I have had the honor of analyzing and organizing Mr. Brown’s personal collection of photographs, papers and other historically and culturally relevant ephemera, for donation to a major institution on behalf of his family. I could hardly believe my eyes at some of the things I held in my hands in the Harlem office where I spent hours examining Mr. Brown’s collection: a personal letter to Mr. Brown from Harold Jackman, a prominent Harlem Renaissance figure. Mr. Brown’s Howard Players member card, programs from their plays, and a photo of them in Norway at the home of the Norwegian ambassador, surrounding him at his piano in 1949. There are pages and pages of Mr. Brown’s writing: attempts at poems, short stories, English homework and drafts of articles he wrote for Howard’s school newspaper, “The Hilltop” and copies of the actual newspapers. There are Columbia University bursar’s receipts from 1952 (he briefly attended graduate school there) and show programs, posters, tickets, letters and photos from much of his life and career. Mr. Brown was a member of the Negro Ensemble Company, where he worked with actors such as Roxie Roker (his Howard classmate) in “The River Niger,” Laurence Fishburne and Esther Rolle. He was also in several productions of the Greenwich Mews Theater, a theater famous for it’s integrated productions in the 1950s and a member of the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. In the 1960s and 1970s, made several appearances on Broadway (Gore Vidal’s “Weekend”) and with Joseph’s Papp’s New York Shakespeare Festival, including “The Black Picture Show” in 1975. His film credits included “Malcolm X,” “Clockers,” “Sanford & Son,” and “Law & Order.” Mr. Brown died on December 13, 2011 at the age of 87.
There are versatile artists, and then there is Geoffrey Holder. Born in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad in 1930, Mr. Holder danced with his brother Boscoe’s dance troupe as a child. He arrived in New York in 1952 at the invitation of the legendary choreographer, Agnes de Mille and, to pay his fare, he sold 20 of his paintings. He would go on to win a Guggenheim Fellowship for painting in 1957. A few years before, he was a principal dancer at the Metropolitan Opera Ballet and appeared on Broadway in Truman Capote’s “House of Flowers,” where he would meet his wife of 57 years, the dancer Carmen de Lavallade.
In 1975, Mr. Holder won 2 Tony Awards in the same evening for directing and choreographing the Broadway musical, “The Wiz.” He is best known to most for his film and commercial roles: as Baron Samedi in the 1973 James Bond film, “Live and Let Die” and of course, as the “Un-cola Man” in the ubiquitous 1970s 7-Up commercials. Mr. Holder is still painting and creating art today and, the DuSable Museum of African American History in Chicago currently has an exhibition featuring Mr. Holder and Ms. de Lavallade. In this picture, Mr. Holder is sitting in front of one of his painting, sometime in the 1960s. Photo: Bradley Smith/Corbis.
A Twitter fan tweeted this awesome shot I shared last year of the one and only Malcolm X in Chicago in 1961. The picture was taken by the legendary photographer Eve Arnold who died on January 4, 2012 at the age of 99, just three months short of her 100th birthday. I’m pretty sure this is my favorite picture of Malcolm X.
Sidney Poitier and Nat “King” Cole cutting up at the 1963 #Oscars at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, April 8, 1963. One of my favorite pictures EVER! Photo: Michael Ochs Archives, Corbis.
Happy 71st Birthday to Muhammad Ali! The Greatest and, quite possibly, The Handsomest of All Time, was born Cassius Clay in Louisville, Kentucky. This photo of Mr. Ali was taken in 1966 in London, where he was training for his upcoming fight with British champion Henry Cooper. Photo: Keystone-France/Getty.
Happy 82nd Birthday to James Earl Jones! Mr. Jones, who is almost as handsome as his father, Robert Earl Jones (!), was born 82 years ago today in Arkabutla, Mississippi! This photo was taken on May 29, 1961 by Carl Van Vechten.
Blues pianist and singer, Charles Brown, circa 1948. Mr. Brown was born in Texas City, Texas in 1922 and earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Prairie View College in 1942. After a brief career as a high school science teacher, Mr. Brown eventually moved to Los Angeles where he joined Johnny Moore and the Three Blazers. Best known for his composition, “Driftin Blues,” he also recorded a very popular version of “Merry Christmas, Baby.” Mr. Brown’s was a big influence on Ray Charles and in the late 1980s, he saw a career revival thanks to Bonnie Raitt, when he toured as her opening act. A member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Mr. Brown died at the age of 76 in 1999. Photo: Gilles Petard/Redferns.
Paul Robeson, majestic singer and actor, brilliant scholar and athlete, fierce political activist and all-around renaissance man, in a 1925 photo by Edward Gooch. According to Shadow And Act, David Harewood, the British actor and star of Showtime’s “Homeland” is in talks to portray Mr. Robeson in an upcoming film. Wynton Marsalis has signed on to score the film as well.
