Rookie Davis Chronology

Edna (Rookie) Davis

Sources for this chronology include the Albany Times Union, Google, Ancestry.com, and the New York Age newspaper.

23 April 1938

Buffalo Courier-Express

Vendome Hotel

175-1777 Clinton Street

Buffalo, NY

Rookie Davis and Banjo Bernie

15 Oct 1938

Times Union

Snug Haven

75 Division Street, Below Pearl

Rookie Davis, Comedienne, direct from Harlem

22 Oct 1938

Snug Haven

75 Division Street, Below Pearl

Debonaires Orchestra w/Rookie Davis

5 Nov 1938

NY Age

Rookie Davis and his Debonaires featuring Virginia Scott, Greta Ross, and Rose Chapman are really bringing them in at the Snug Haven. The Debonaires can really play.

7 Feb 1939

Walkill Valley World

New Paltz, NY

Horse Shoe Bar

251 Washington St.

Newburg, NY

Rookie Davis and Her Debonnaires of Swing

1 March 1939

NY Age

. Rookie Davis' Debonaines, direct from the Horseshoe Bar, N.J. now playing an unlimited engagement in Troy. The personnel is as follows: Benny Moreland, Gus Robertson, Horace Clayton, Tommy Walters, Ernest Parkham. Bernie Roberson and Rookie Davis, Dynamo.

8 April 1939

Club Morocco

2-1^st Street

Troy, NY

Rookie Davis and her All-Colored Band

6 May 1939

Times Union

Club Morocco

Troy

Rookie Davis and her famous 10 Piece All Colored Band is taking the Capital District music fans by storm.

13 May 1939

Swing Inn

Albany-Sch Rd

Rookie Davis and her 10 Piece Band – the liveliest, sweetest, swinging band in the Capital District.

7 July 1939

Plattsburg Daily Press

Plattsburg, NY

Tonight - Doors open 8 P. M. Performance 9 P.M. CAVALCADE OF STARS 20 ACTS - 50 PEOPLE 50 on Mammoth Stage front of Grand Stand FAIRGROUNDS - T0NITE and TOMORROW NITE "ROOKIE DAVIS and Her NYC Plantation Club and Revue… CIRCUS — VAUDEVILLE — NOVELTIES

8 July 1939

Times Union

“Rudd’s Beach Stop 7 or 11, Albany-Schenectady Road offers a stellar attraction in the person of Rookie Davis and her orchestra, the girl who is a show in herself…”

Ad states – “One of the outstanding colored bands in the country”.

16 Sept 1939

NY Age

Rookie Davis's orchestra, featuring Banjo Bernie, closed the summer season at the Labor Day dance in Shaffer's Grove; They are booked to play for the winter at the Morocco Club in Troy, NY

11 Nov 1939

Indianapolis Recorder, p. 13

Harlem: A trouper who has made the rounds of the principal cities is EDNA (Rookie) DAVIS, slim waisted little bunch of sunshine and laughter who holds the fort at Dickie Wells each night. The “Johnny come Latelys” knew very little of her save that she is an exceptionally clever soubrette and comedienne. Her orchestra, with big Bernie Robinson beating out the ivories, is worth the evening’s bill and when “Rookie” brings on her famous act which calls for shoes only a Primo Carnera could wear with any degree of comfort…it’s a sure killer-diller. Years before, Josephine Baker the petted darling of Paris’s Montmartre center, Miss Davis was La Baker’s understudy in…”Chocolate Dan Dies.” Wonder of Josephine married and later divorced from an Italian nobleman, remembers her little stand-in who is knocking time dead tonight in lil old Harlemtown?

Miller and Lyles quickly saw great possibilities in the lass who made 12-inch shoes as famous as Cinderella’s tiny slipper and her next starring vehicle was “Keep Shufflin” and “Running the Town”. Completing the run of the aforementioned stage productions, Rookie took a flyer into nightlife here. Park Central Hotel, Club Monterey, Broadway Club, Million Dollar Ballroom and Edwin Small’s well known Paradise Club paid her salary five consecutive seasons. Harking to the call of the west we can trace her to Los Angeles’ great Club Alabam, a six-month contract serving to entrench her in the hearts of nightlife patrons. Then following another stage flyer, a “Black and Tan Revue” at the Lincoln Theater and other western houses. Always Rookie gave her praise unstintingly to her clever partner of those days Joyce Robinson, an eccentric dancer second to none. Apollo theater’s LEONARD featured the duo some ten years ago in Philadelphia in a comedy known as “Monkey Shines”. Topsy and Eva, being the cast of Robinson-Davies that audiences thrilled to.

Two years of solid bookings on the burlesque wheel, and today, we find Rookie steadily climbing up the ladder of fame via a cracker-jack orchestra unit and novelty act. Looks like Dickie Wells has gone out and stolen a march on the field, from where we sit!

(NOTE: we copied this verbatim from a digitized copy of the newspaper source. Typos may be the result of faults in the optical character recognition system during the scanning process).

4 Oct 1941 – 1 Nov 1941 – gig at Hotel Broadway, Albany

11 Oct 1941 – NY Age

“The Broadway Hotel had their opening last Saturday with a new band and show directly from New York City. The band had just finished an engagement from the Bankers Club in Atlantic City. “Rookie Davis and her Debonnaires” is a very good swing band and is composed of the following men: Earl Jackson reed, Frank (Pat) Patton alto, King Oliver, tenor and arranger, Jesse Brown, trumpet, Tommy Crauston, trombone, Lonnie Giles, Bass violin, Banjo Bernie, piano, Melvin Butler, guitar, Milo Murdoch drums.

Mrs. Davis puts on a very good show with the following artist: Fifi Wanger, Blues singer, Billy Keith, torch singer, Chiquite, Shake dancer, and how she shakes. Davis and Davis, Rhumba team. The little Wraye girl brought down the house. Mrs. Rookie Davis, comedian works very hard to put over this very good show.”

25 Oct 1941 – NY Age

“Some new men have been engaged for the Rookie’s Debonnaire Band playing nightly at the Broadway Hotel Grill. The men are Drummer Walter Hesseley, Trumpet, Ernest Thompson, Sax, Ted Crowell, who had been in an accident and has returned from Kansas City, who formerly played in Jay McShane’s Band before joining up with Rookie. The Band is doing well at the hotel, and the show that Mrs. Rookie Davis puts on nightly is the talk of the town.”

29 Nov 1941 – 31 Dec 1941

Stuarts – 4-6 Sheridan Avenue

Albany

Promoted as:

29 Nov 41 – Rookie Davis “The Toast of Harlem”

6 Dec 41 – Rookie Davis presents The Harlem Hot Shots and Her All-Star Revue in Technicolor

26 Dec 41 – Rookie Davis and her Harlem Swing Band

11 June 1942

The Evening Capital

Annapolis, MD

Marriage Licenses

Banjo Bernie Roberson, 46, and Edna Rookie Davis, 36, Baltimore.