Artists

Alvin Ailey was born in Rogers, Texas in 1931 during the height of the Great Depression. In 1942, his mother brought him to Los Angeles to find work in the war effort. He attended a predominantly black high school in Los Angeles and became involved in the Glee Club. His interests were in music, language and poetry. He then started attending theaters in the city and developed an interest in dance.

In 1949, he was introduced to the great dance choreographer Lester Horton. He began his training in the art of dance. For a brief time, he left the dance studio to study romance languages and literature. In 1951, he met Maya Angelou in San Francisco and began performing with her in night clubs. By 1952, he returned to Horton’s studio and began his full-time career in dance with Horton’s company.

Suddenly, in November of 1953, Horton died and left the company without an artistic director. When no one else stepped forward to take the position, 22-year old Ailey stepped in to take the position. In 1954, he and his friend, dancer Carmen de Lavallade, travelled to New York to dance in the Truman Capote Broadway show “House of Flowers,” starring Pearl Bailey and Diahann Carroll. He appeared in other Broadway musicals for the next three years.

In 1958, Ailey formed the “Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater” after becoming frustrated with what he perceived as poor and inferior modern dance techniques being used in New York. His style was revolutionary and incorporated his training in ballet, modern dance, jazz and African dance techniques. The musical accompaniment of his performances were intense with blues, spiritual and gospel tones. In 1960, he produced “Revelations,” the story of African-Americans struggle from slavery to freedom.

Throughout his career, Ailey created 79 works. His company continues to this day as one of the finest dance companies in the United States. The company earned the title of “Cultural Ambassador to the World” due to their extensive international performances. In 1977, Ailey was awarded the Spingarn Medal from the NAACP. One year before his death, Ailey received the Kennedy Center Honors. Ailey died from complications from AIDS in 1989. In 2014, President Barack Obama posthumously awarded Ailey with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Ailey is considered one of the great artists of the 20th century and a great American.

Charles Alston was born in Charlotte, North Carolina and was the son of a minister and former slave. Alston's father died when he was the age of three. Throughout his youth, Charles had a love of drawing, sculpture and painting. In 1915, his family moved to New York City during the period known as the Great Migration. He graduated from DeWitt Clinton High School with honors in academic excellence and was the art editor of the school's magazine. He also studied anatomy at the National Academy of Art on Saturdays.

Charles had numerous scholarship offers. He turned down Yale to attend Columbia University in New York City. In 1929, he earned a Bachelor's Degree and in 1931 he earned a Master's Degree from Columbia University's Teachers College. During his time as a student in high school and college, he was heavily influenced by the Harlem Renaissance. He enjoyed art and jazz music and spent much of his free time in the Harlem scene.

In 1934, he founded the Harlem Art Workshop as a center of creativity in Harlem. Alston became the first black supervisor of the Federal Art Project in 1935. He directed the creation of murals in Harlem's hospitals. Two of his works were exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in 1936. In 1938, he received two Rosenwald Fellowships to travel the southern part of the United States. He also did various illustrations for magazines such as Fortune, Mademoiselle and The New Yorker. He illustrated album covers from Duke Ellington and book covers for Langston Hughes.

During World War II, Alston was appointed as an artist in the Office of War Information and Public Relations. He created images of noted African-Americans and their accomplishments to be published in newspapers all around the United States. He was appointed to create murals for the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Building in Los Angeles. In 1967, President Lyndon Johnson granted Alston an appointment as a trustee of the Kennedy Center. He became a full professor at Columbia University and City College of New York in 1973.

Alston is considered one of the greatest artist of American history. His depiction of African-Americans and their lives have added to the American fabric. Alston is truly one of America's greatest.

Janet Collins was born in 1917 in New Orleans, Louisiana. At the age of four, Janet’s grandmother insisted that the entire family move to Los Angeles because blacks were denied access to the public library. When they arrived in California, Janet developed an interest in dancing. When she was denied access to dance classes with white students, her mother paid for private lessons by sewing costumes.

At the age of 15, Collins was allowed to audition for The Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo. The master, Leonide Massine, was so impressed with her talent that he said she could join the company only if she painted her face and body white. She refused and was barred from joining. For the next 16 years, she was an outcast in the dance world until she moved to New York. There, she was allowed to dance to her own choreography a the 92nd Street YMHA. It was because of this performance that she was finally “discovered.”

In 1950, she appeared in the Cole Porter musical “Out of this World,” in which she received the Donaldson Award for Best Broadway dancer. In 1952, she became the first African-American prima ballerina with the Metropolitan Opera. She had the lead roles in “Aida,” “Samson and Delilah,” and “Carmen.” She began to tour throughout the world, appeared on television variety shows, and gave solo dance recitals.

Later in life, she taught at several colleges and dance institutes, including the School of American Ballet in New York City. After she retired from teaching in 1974, she became a painter of religious art from a studio in Seattle, Washington until her death in 2003. Janet Collins was a pioneer in the field of dance who fought racial prejudice and rejection throughout her early life. Her talent and resolve helped her to break through those barriers to become one of the greatest dancers in American history. Janet Collins story is one of a great American.

Aaron Douglas was born in Topeka, Kansas in 1899. From an early age, he had an interest in art. After graduating from Topeka High School in 1917, he attended the University of Nebraska at Lincoln to study art. He received his bachelor’s degree of fine arts in 1922 and another bachelor’s from the University of Kansas in 1923. Afterwards, Douglas moved to Harlem in New York City to begin his career.

Within a few months after moving to New York City, Douglas landed a job illustrating for “The Crisis” magazine of the NAACP as well as “Opportunity” magazine of the Urban League. He also began to study art under the guidance of Winold Reiss, a German artist who helped him develop a modernist style. Douglas began to mix this new style with African and Egyptian styles. His work caught the attention of the renowned “Dean” of the Harlem Renaissance, Dr. Alain Locke.

During his years in Harlem, Douglas illustrated numerous books and magazines. He travelled and studied African and Modern European Art at the Barnes Foundation outside of Philadelphia. In 1931, he travelled to Paris and studied for a year and the Academie Scandinave. Upon his return to the United States, Douglas was commissioned to paint murals and paintings on canvas. He was commissioned to paint murals for Fisk University in Nashville as well as the New York Public Library’s 135th Street Branch.

In 1940, Douglas moved to Nashville, Tennessee and started the Art Department at Fisk University. He would spend the next 27 years teaching at Fisk and began shifting his painting style to a more traditional form. His work documented the lives of black Americans as well as the accomplishments of the Civil Rights Movement. His artwork was displayed at numerous galleries, universities, hotels and museums. His unique style of modernist, African, European and traditional gave his work a style unique in America. His depictions of the lives of African-Americans during the Harlem Renaissance and the Civil Rights Movement made Douglas a great American.

Robert S. Duncanson was born in Seneca County, New York around 1821. His mother was African-American and his father was Scottish Canadian. For the early part of his childhood, Duncanson lived in Canada with his father. However, he moved back to the United States in 1841 to live with his mother in Mount Pleasant, Ohio, just outside Cincinnati.

Duncanson loved art and learned to paint on his own. His favorite artist was Thomas Cole, a landscape artist of the Hudson River School. By 1842, he began to exhibit some of his portraits and received several commissions. That same year, he was sponsored by the Society for the Promotion of Useful Knowledge to show an exhibit, but his family was barred from attending because they were African-Americans.

Duncanson's improved his skills over the next decade and he became known for his landscape art. In 1851, Nicholas Longworth, a winemaker in the area, commissioned eight murals from Duncanson to decorate the foyer of his villa. Today, Longworth's home is the Taft Museum of Art in Cincinnati.

In 1853, Duncanson was asked to illustrate Harriet Beecher Stowe's book "Uncle Tom's Cabin." Because of his illustrations, he was financed by the Freeman's Aid Society and the Anti-Slave League to tour Europe. While in Europe, Duncanson became influenced by the great 17th century French artist Claude Lorrain. When he returned to the United States, he began working in the photography studio of the great African-American photographer James Presley Ball. Duncanson worked on colorizing Ball's photographs. Both men created a 600-yard long mural called the "Mammoth Pictorial Tour of the United States Comprising Views of the African Slave Trade." The mural toured the country and was a huge success.

When the Civil War broke out, Duncanson left the United States to live first in Montreal, Canada and then London, England. He continued to paint and tour throughout Canada and Europe. In the winter of 1866, he returned to Cincinnati to continue his work. He created some of his greatest paintings during this time. Most of his paintings were pastoral in nature. He continued to paint up until his death in 1872.

Duncanson was a pioneer in American art and is one of the greatest artists in the nation's history. His paintings of the landscapes of America and Europe are still displayed in museums throughout the world. The Smithsonian Institute has 22 of Duncanson's paintings in their collection. Duncanson was a great American.

She was born Meta Warwick in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1877. Her mother was a beautician and her father was a barber. Her family enjoyed considerable standing the in the upper-middle class black community of Philadelphia. Meta was given private dance, horseback riding and art lessons.

After attending public school, she was awarded a scholarship to the Pennsylvania Museum and School for Industrial Art. She was one of the very few black students to attend. She won several awards there and was even granted a one-year post-graduate scholarship to specialize in sculpture.

She graduated in 1899 and was honored for her sculpture “Crucifixion of Christ in Agony.” She travelled to Paris, France to study abroad and refine her art. Unfortunately, she was turned away from the American Girls’ Club for living arrangements because of the color of her skin. She was able to find other accommodations thanks to help from noted black American artist Henry O. Tanner.

After her studies in Paris, she became the protege of noted French artist Auguste Rodin. She gained notoriety in France and was dubbed “the delicate sculptor of horrors” by the French Press for her depictions of the human condition in her work. After successfully studying and refining her work, she returned to Philadelphia in 1903.

Upon returning to the United States, she became the first black woman to receive a commission from the United States government to create art for the Tercentennial Celebration of Jamestown as well as the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Despite this, she was shunned by the artistic community in Philadelphia on account of her race.

In 1909, she married noted African-American doctor Soloman Fuller. They moved to Framington, Massachusetts and she had three children. She continued creating sculpture as well as poetry. Her new husband did not want her pursuing a career in art. Rather, he wanted her to take on the more traditional role of mother and hostess of the house. She refused the confinement and continued her art outside the home. With her own money and without her husband’s knowledge, she built a studio away from the home to continue her work.

At the age of 80 and after the death of her husband, Meta embarked on massive amount of creativity. Most of the proceeds from her art were donated to the Civil Rights Movement. She died in 1968, but her contribution to art made her a great American.

William Henry Johnson was born in 1901 in Florence, South Carolina. As a child, Johnson became interested in art, copying cartoons from local newspapers. He dropped out of junior high school in order to support his family. At the age of 17, he moved to New York City, taking a variety of odd jobs. Johnson saved his money so that he could enroll and take classes at the National Academy of Design in New York City.

In 1918, he began taking preparatory classes with several artists at the academy. He primarily studied classical portraiture. In 1923, Johnson began working with Charles Webster Hawthorne and he was introduced to color in painting. During the summers, he moved to Provincetown, Massachusetts to study at the Cape Cod School of Art. Hawthorne recognized Johnson’s talent and helped raise money to send him to Paris upon his graduation in 1926.

After moving to Paris, he began studying and painting with other artists that influenced his style. During this time, he met Danish textile-artist Holcha Krake, whom he would eventually marry in 1930. Johnson travelled throughout France, Corsica, Belgium and Denmark. He returned in 1929 to New York City to show come of his European paintings in the Harmon Foundation show where he received the coveted gold medal. He travelled back to visit his family in Florence and painted several new works. He was arrested for painting on a local building and after being released, left South Carolina for Denmark.

After marrying Krake in 1930, Johnson and his new wife began travelling to North Africa and other parts of Europe. However, tension began to rise in Denmark as Nazism became a threat to their interracial marriage. They left Denmark in 1938 to start a new life in New York City. Johnson and his wife moved to Harlem and he began teaching at the Harlem Community Art Center, partially funded by the Federal Art Project in the Works Progress Administration. He began the transition to a more primitive folk-style of artwork. He used life in Harlem, the South and the military as the inspiration for his new form. His painting also served as commentaries on the segregation of African-Americans in the US Army during World War II. It was in Harlem where Johnson did his most famous work, and his genius was nationally recognized. In 1941, he gained a solo exhibition at the prestigious Alma Reed Galleries.

Tragedy struck in 1942 when his studio was destroyed by fire. Less than two years later, his wife died of breast cancer. He moved back to Florence and began painting religious themes and a new series he called “Fighter for Freedom.” While visiting his wife’s family in Denmark in 1946, Johnson became erratic. He was sent back to the United States and was diagnosed with syphilis. He spent the next 23 years of his life in an asylum until his death.

Lawrence was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey in 1917. He moved to Pennsylvania at an early age before settling in Harlem, New York at the age of thirteen. During this time, he showed an aptitude for art, but black students rarely ever attended art schools. Therefore, much of his training and inspiration took place in Harlem during the Harlem Renaissance. He also made frequent trips to the Metropolitan Museum of Art where he studied the works of van Gogh, Goya, Matisse and Giotto.

In his early 20's, Lawrence developed a new form of modernism based on his experiences in Harlem. He was inspired by the lives of African-Americans there and his work pictured their lives. He covered subjects such as poverty, racial tensions, police brutality and crime. He took art classes in a garage with Augusta Savage. He started to develop a reputation as a great artist. This led to his acceptance into the American Artists School in New York on a scholarship. He also found work with the WPA Federal Art Project painting during the Depression.

His work concentrated on African-American history. He did a series of paintings on such African-Americans as Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, and Toussanint L'Ouverture. He even did a series of paintings on the great abolitionist leader John Brown. Lawrence created a sixty-panel set of paintings depicting the Great Migration of blacks from the South to urban areas of the north. By the 1940's, he was given his first solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

Lawrence has been honored as an artist, teacher and humanitarian. His achievements made him one of the greatest American artists of the 20th Century. He captured the history of African-Americans in his paintings. His work and achievements made him a great American.

Oscar Micheaux was born in Metropolis, Illinois in 1884. His father was a former slave. Soon after his birth, he moved to Great Bend, Kansas and he was sent to school. Despite being a good student, Micheaux dropped out of high school and worked many odd jobs before making his way to Chicago. After working several jobs there, Micheaux landed a position as a Pullman porter and travelled west. He fell in love with the American west as he travelled from Colorado to Oregon. He saved enough money at the job to homestead some land in South Dakota and started farming in 1905. It was successful for a short period of time, but he lost everything due to drought and lost his homestead.

In 1910, he published his first article in the Chicago Defender about blacks creating lives independent of whites. He found success and raised enough money to publish his first book, “The Conquest: The Story of a Negro Pioneer” in 1913. His book became so successful that he wrote two sequels to both. Micheaux sold them door-to-door throughout the country. After his second novel’s publication, “The Homesteader,” he converted his publishing company into a film company. He sold stock to raise money to produce a film based on his second novel. His movie became the first feature-length film made by an African-American. His film career took off.

His films became known as “race” films because they were completely cast by all African-Americans for black audiences. His second film, “Within Our Gates,” was a response to D.W. Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation” which glorified the Ku Klux Klan. The film was shocking to its audiences due to its portrayal of rape, lynching, and racial bigotry.

Over the next 30 years, Micheaux made over 40 movies. In 1925, his movie “Body and Soul” featured a young newcomer to the screen, Paul Robeson. By 1931, his movie “The Exile” was the first movie with sound made by an African-American. Micheaux took charge of nearly all aspects of the film, including casting, writing, scoring, directing and promotion.

He died in 1951 while promoting one of his films. In 1986, he was posthumously given the Golden Jubilee Special Directorial Award. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Farm. He was inducted into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame, issued a postage stamp by the US Postal service, and considered one of the most influential African-Americans in history. A documentary was made about his life in 2014 and HBO has announced production of a film about his life, starring Tyler Perry. His contribution to film and literature have made Micheaux a Great American.

George Olden was born the grandson of a slave in Birmingham, Alabama in 1920. When he was a few months old, the family moved to Washington, DC. Olden excelled in art at a very early age and became an accomplished artist while attending Dunbar High School. He was an excellent swimmer as well. Olden drew cartoons for the magazine "Flash." He failed most of his academic classes and graduated a year behind his class. He went on to attend Virginia State College where he became a cartoonist for the newspaper.

Just as things started to go better for Olden academically, the United States was drawn into World War II after the attack on Pearl Harbor. In January of 1942, he dropped out of college and joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) as a graphic designer. While in the OSS, he met many of the great graphic designers of the time. He created posters, ads, and cartoons to help in the war effort. He also was published in the New Yorker Magazine, Esquire Magazine, and the National CIO News. He decided to drop the "e" from his first name and go by the name Georg.

After the war, Olden was recruited to work for the CBS television network. He became one of the first black advertising executives in American history. While at CBS, he was invited to San Francisco to serve a graphic designer to the International Secretariat of the newly formed United Nations.

Olden became one of the first artists to design news graphics for CBS News. He also designed the "eye' logo for the CBS Network. He supervised the vote-tallying graphics for the 1952 Presidential Election. His reputation grew and he was placed in charge of the graphics for some of the biggest television shows of the era, including The Ed Sullivan Show, Lassie, Gunsmoke, The Late Show, Face the Nation, and many others. By 1956, Olden won the New York Art Directors Club medal.

Olden left CBS in 1960 to work for the BBDO Advertising Company. He worked there for three years before becoming vice president of the McCann-Erickson Firm. Also in 1963, the United States Postal Service commissioned Olden to design a five-cent stamp commemorating the Emancipation Proclamation. He became the first African-American to design a stamp. He later designed a postage stamp commemorating the Voice of America.

Later in life, Olden went on to start his own company in southern California. He directed an episode of the "Mod Squad" television show. In January of 1975, he was shot and killed, allegedly by his live-in girlfriend. Despite the tragic end to his life, Olden broke many barriers by becoming an prominent African-American in the advertising world. In 1988, he received the AIGA Medal for his pioneering contributions to the field of television graphics. His contributions to art and the new age of television made him a great American.

She was born Zelda Mavin Jackson in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1911. Her father was killed in an automobile accident when she was six years old. Her mother remarried and the family moved to the suburbs of Pittsburgh. During high school, she began writing sports articles for the Pittsburgh Courier, a weekly African-American newspaper. She was also an accomplished self-taught artist and worked on the high school yearbook. She was known as “Jackie” after her last name. After high school in 1930, she began full-time work at the newspaper as a proofreader, writer and editor. She also married Earl Ormes in 1936, but separated from him after only a year of marriage, choosing not to divorce. They had one child.

On May 1, 1937, she debuted a comic strip called “Torchy Brown in Dixie to Harlem” which gained national syndication. It was about the adventures of a teenager from Mississippi who travelled to New York to become a singer in the Cotton Club. Her humorous comic took on issues such as racism, pollution, literacy, and morals. The strip ran until 1940. She became the first female African-American cartoonist in American history.

In 1942, she moved to Chicago and wrote for The Chicago Defender, one of the leading black newspapers in the country. She also created a new comic strip called “Candy” after World War II. In 1945, she returned to Pittsburgh to create a strip called “Patty-Jo ‘n’ Ginger” which ran for 11 years. It featured a young black girl who had insight into social and political issues of the day. By 1950, she added a remake of “Torchy” into the newspaper. In the newspaper were paper doll cut-outs of the main character, depicting black women as well-dressed with healthy physiques instead of the demeaning black-female stereotypes of the time. The new depiction of the character touched on issues such as free speech, the Red Scare, interracial marriage, and segregation.

Ormes was forced to retire in 1956 due to rheumatoid arthritis. She moved to Chicago and continued to volunteer for her community by organizing fashion shows. She was an avid doll collector and involved with various doll clubs throughout the country. She was a founding board member for the DuSable Museum of African-American History in 1961. Ormes passed away in 1985 of a cerebral hemorrhage. In 2014, she was inducted into the National Association of Black Journalists Hall of Fame. Her art and passion for contemporary issues through comics made Ormes a Great American.

Gordon Roger Alexander Buchanan Parks was born in Fort Scott, Kansas. He was born stillborn and declared dead. However, another doctor had the idea of immersing him in ice-cold water. The shock started the heart beating and he survived. He was named for the doctor that saved his life. He was the youngest of 15 children. When his mother died at the age of fourteen, he moved to live with his older sister in Minneapolis, Minnesota. However, her husband kicked him out and he lived homeless for a time. He took odd jobs as a piano player, busboy, Civilian Conservation Corpsman, train porter and waiter.

In 1938, he bought a used camera for $7.50 and began teaching himself photography and became a freelance photographer. By 1944, he was the only black photographer for Vogue Magazine and by 1948, he was the only black photographer for Life Magazine. Life Magazine sent him to Europe as well as across the United States to take photographs. He documented the Civil Rights Movement, segregation in the South, the rise of the Nation of Islam and the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.

In addition to photography, he wrote an autobiography called "The Learning Tree" about his life in Kansas. Warner Brothers expressed interest in the book as a movie and hired Parks to direct it. He became the first African-American to direct a film for a major studio. He went on to direct the cult film "Shaft" and its sequels with MGM. These were the first movies with a black hero in an action film. The success of the "Shaft" series helped to save MGM from bankruptcy. His most critically acclaimed film was a biography of the bluesman Leadbelly. He started the magazine "Essence," won both the Spingarn Medal and the National Medal of the Arts. He authored 18 books and even became an actor.

Parks rose from death to become one of America's greatest artists of the visual medium. His impact has created a visual record of America during the 20th Century. He lived to be 93 years of age and was truly a great American.

Augusta Fells was born in Green Cove Springs, Florida on leap-day of 1892. As a small child, she would use the natural clay in the area to sculpt small animals. Her father, a Methodist minister, believed this was a sinful act and would beat her when he found them. Her family moved to West Palm Beach in 1915 and she could not find any natural clay. She was forced to go to a local potter to obtain clay. After making a sculpture of the Virgin Mary, her father changed his mind about his daughter's artistic activities.

The principal of her high school recognized that she had a talent and encouraged her to study art. After high school, she tried to make it as a sculptor in Jacksonville, Florida with little success. She decided to move to New York City. There, she enrolled in the Copper Union Art School. She excelled at the school, but was met with discrimination. He was denied an opportunity to study in France due to her race. While in school, she met and married James Savage, but divorced after just a few months. Despite the divorce, she kept the last name. She graduated from the institution after just three years of the four-year program.

Savage worked in a laundry to make ends meet. She moved her family to New York from Florida to support them. It was during this time that she received her first commission for a portrait sculpture by W.E.B. DuBois. The bust was so popular that she received more commissions, include one for Marcus Garvey. In 1925, she received a scholarship to study in Europe, but lacked the funds to make the trip. News spread of her financial situation, and many people donated money from Harlem and several African-American institutions to pay for her studies. In 1929, she was financially able to study at a prestigious art school in Paris. Once there, she studied with the great French sculptor Charles Despiau.

When she arrived back in the United States in 1932, Savage found it hard to find commissions due to the Great Depression. She started the Savage Studio of Arts and Crafts and began teaching art. She taught many of the great African-American artists, including the renowned Jacob Lawrence. She became a director for the WPA's Harlem Community Center. In 1939, she received a commission to create a sculpture for the New York World's Fair. Her work was called "The Harp" and it depicted African-American faces as a part of a human-harp.

Savage spent most of the rest of her life teaching art in the Catskill Mountains of New York. She continued to create sculptures but chose to focus on teaching African-American youth the joys of art. Her contribution to the Harlem Renaissance and American art have made her a great American.

Thelma Johnson was born in Yakima, Washington in 1912. She moved around throughout her childhood in Idaho, Oregon and Washington. She began painting at the age of seven and showed great talent. By her senior year in high school, she gained national recognition when her painting, “A Priest,” which won honorable mention at the Harmon Foundation exhibit in New York City.

After high school, she began studying art the Museum Art School in Portland, Oregon. She proved a multi-talented artist using oil, watercolor, charcoal sketches, and textile design. She briefly attended the University of Oregon until she married Romaine Virgil Streat in 1935. She began working for the Works Progress Administration’s Federal Art Project in California. In 1942, she became the first African-American woman to feature her work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. One of her most famous paintings, “Rabbit Man,” was purchased for permanent display by the museum. She also began collaborating with Mexican muralist Diego Rivera while working in Los Angeles. Rivera and Streat both worked on the Pan American Unity mural in San Francisco.

In 1943, she displayed a painting titled “Death of a Black Sailor” at the American Contemporary Gallery in Hollywood. The painting depicted the thoughts of a dying black soldier with regard to segregation and the Red Cross’s refusal to accept black blood. She received death threats from the Ku Klux Klan. In 1945, she travelled to Chicago to chair a committee sponsoring murals to aid “Negro in Labor” education. In 1947, she was commissioned by a women’s sportswear manufacturer to create original fabric designs for their spring collection. While painting and designing, Streat began studying interpretative dance by Native Americans in Mexico and Canada. She also travelled to Haiti, Indonesia and Australia to study dance.

In 1948, Streat divorced and married her art manager. They moved to Honolulu to established the “Children’s City of Hawaii and New School of Expression” art center. She painted images of well-known Americans such as Marion Anderson, Paul Robeson, Harriet Tubman and Frank Lloyd Wright. She began expanding her repertoire by becoming a playwright and film producer. She travelled to Europe and promoted her plays, dance, films and artwork throughout the continent. In 1949, she was the first American woman to have her own television program while in Paris. In 1950, she was asked to perform a dance recital at Buckingham Palace for the royal family. By 1956, she had established a second school in British Columbia.

Streat died suddenly of a heart attack in 1959. Today, her artwork is on permanent display at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African-American History and Culture in Washington, DC. She was a pioneer that influenced many African-American artists. Her work and contributions to modern art made her a Great American.

Theophilus Augustus Thompson was born into slavery in 1855 in Frederick, Maryland. After emancipation, he worked as a house servant in Carroll County between 1868 and 1870. He returned to Frederick and witnessed a chess game for the first time in April of 1872. One of the players was John K. Hanshew, the publisher of “The Maryland Chess Review.” Hanshew gave Thompson a chess board and gave him some chess problems to solve. It was the beginning of his chess career.

Thompson solved the chess problems for Hanshew and decided to create and solve his own chess problems. All of this was accomplished despite the fact that Thompson was illiterate. Thompson began picking up chess matches and winning with astounding ease. He was aggressive and methodical. He was invited at some point to attend a chess tournament in Chicago where he fared very well. Afterwards, Thompson landed a job as a servant to Orestes Brownson, Jr., who was the publisher of the “Dubuque Chess Journal.” Brownson was amazed by Thompson’s master of the game and in 1874 helped him publish a book, titled “Chess Problems: Either to Play and Mate, or Compel Self-mate in Four Moves.” Thompson was hailed as a prodigy in the game of chess and his name spread throughout the chess world. In 1874, he was declared a genius by the City of London Chess Magazine.

When Brownson’s journal closed for business in the late 1870s, Thompson disappeared. He never played chess again and it was not until modern investigation of the US Census records that anything was known about Thompson. In 1880, he lived outside Annapolis, Maryland as an oysterman. His name turns up in 1920 as married with two children still working as an oysterman. The last record of his life was in the 1930 census when he was listed as a widower in his 80s. No record of him exists after that date. Thompson meteoric rise in the chess world was fleeting, but his contribution to the game and the mathematical theory behind it made Thompson a Great American.

James Van Der Zee was born in Lenox, Massachusetts in 1886. As early as the age of six, Van Der Zee loved photography. His parents had been servants for former President Ulysses S. Grant. By the time he was 20 years old, he and his father moved to Harlem, New York City. He worked as a waiter and elevator operator, but never forgot his love for photography.

In 1916, Van Der Zee moved to Newark, New Jersey to begin working as a darkroom assistant at a portrait studio. After learning the trade for one year, he moved back to Harlem and set up his own studio. His business boomed during World War I. He took normal portraits at his studio, but expanded to photograph clubs, church groups, sports teams, and family portraits. He took photographs of famous African-Americans such as Marcus Garvey, Jack Johnson, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson and Mamie Smith. He used elaborate backdrops to help make his photographs glamorous and exciting.

Van Der Zee was "discovered" in 1968 at the age of 82 when a photo researcher named Reginald McGhee found his collection of 75,000 pictures chronicling the Harlem Renaissance over six decades. His photographs were featured at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art in an exhibit called "Harlem On My Mind.” His photographs received national recognition and Van Der Zee became a celebrity. Famous people such as Lou Rawls, Bill Cosby and Muhammad Ali made it a point to have a sitting for a Van Der Zee portrait.

Van Der Zee lived to be 96 years old. His work today is one of the most complete visual records of the Harlem Renaissance in existence. His eyes behind the camera made him a great American.