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Transcription: [00:00:00]
{SPEAKER name="Ann Shumard"}
Few performers, black or white, have ever matched the sheer star power of Lena Horne.
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But her path to that stardom, was not necessarily an easy road.
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And she had to struggle against expectations of others, and even the high standards that she set for herself. And it wasn't, as I said, it wasn't always easy for her.
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She was born in Brooklyn, New York; and her parents were both the product of middle class, African American families.
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Her paternal Grandmother was very active in the woman's suffrage movement, and very instrumental in the early years of the N.A.A.C.P.
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In fact, she registered Lena for membership in the N.A.A.C.P. when she was two years old.
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Her parent's marriage was, unfortunately, short lived.
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Her father had, what was considered to be, a good and promising job as a civil servant in the state of New York.
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But he was much more interested in better opportunities and more money than he could make in a legitimate job, and as Lena said, he was ultimately sort of lost to the racketeering and numbers running world.
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She always loved him, but it was a situation that was difficult for her, because he abandoned the family when she was just three years old.
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That left Lena and her mother living in the same house with her father's parents, and there was an estranged relationship, really, between Lena's mother and those in-laws.
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And so a short time after Lena's father took off, her mother left the household too; hoping to pursue a career as an actress.
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And she joined the Lafayette Players, which was one of the few legitimate black theater companies.
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And when I say 'legitimate', I meant that the theater that they were performing was classical drama, Shakespeare. Not simply, the sort of music hall, or Vaudeville kinds of performances.
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So, Lena was left in the care of her grandparents.
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But periodically, her mother would resurface after a period of time on the road performing, and reclaim her.
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And so she bounced back and forth between this very stable environment, in her grandparent's middle class home in Brooklyn; and this sort of Gypsy life on the road with her mother, often traveling through the south.
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When she was fifteen years old, both of her grandparents died within a few months of each other.
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She had, at that point, been living with her grandparents again. And her mother then resurfaced; remarried to a white, Cuban-born gentleman, named Mr. Rodriguez.
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And Lena found herself now living with her mother and her step-father.
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They weren't welcome in the Brooklyn neighborhood where Lena's grandparents had lived, and so they resettled in the Bronx.
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It was the height of the depression. It's 1933, and not an easy time for anyone; and her step-father, with his limited English skills, has a terrible time finding work.
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Her mother isn't in good health, and Lena drops out of high school in order to help support the family.
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And her mother's connections in the theater are what land her an audition at the Cotton Club.
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Of course, this is the cabaret in Harlem, on Lenox Avenue; that was originally run by a white gangster, who had bought it from the great boxer, Jack Johnson.
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The Cotton Club was celebrated for African American performance, but it didn't admit African American patrons. At least, not for many years.
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Sooner or later, there was an opportunity for some African American patrons to come to the club, but they were usually seated close to the kitchen,
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and they were generally people who were involved in, sort of the, 'Black Underworld' and it was their underworld connections that got them in.
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Lena joined up as a chorus girl. She wasn't singing at this point, simply dancing.
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And the requirement for the Cotton Club, to be on the chorus, was that one be tall, tan, and terrific.
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And Lena, of course, fit that bill perfectly.
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She was extraordinarily beautiful. She was just sixteen, most of the chorus performers were in their twenties.
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So her mother made a point of being on hand constantly. Her mother was an ever-presence, really, an ever-present figure.
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The typical stage mother who watched over, but also made demands that made life a bit more difficult for Lena.
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Um, her step-father also got involved. And after she had been performing there for more than a year, there was an opportunity and she got to do a song and dance number with one of the Cotton Club's leading stars.
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After that, her parent's were pushing for her to get more featured roles.
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And the management at the Cotton Club wasn't really ready to, you know, to accede to those demands.
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And her step-father ended up really badly roughed up in an encounter with some of the heavies at the club.
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She was able to appear briefly in a Broadway show that only ran for nine performances, and her role in that was simply a dancing role.
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But she had figured that once her step-father got roughed up, she was going to have to get out of the Cotton Club. And the only way she could do that, was really to run away.
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She was able to audition with Noble Sissle's Society Orchestra.
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She attended the audition in Philadelphia, and was signed on.
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Now, Noble Sissle had a very popular band; and she was really surprised that she got the job.
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Because she said that she wasn't really much of a singer, at that point. She had- she could carry a tune, but that was about it.
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Well, Noble Sissle knew talent when he saw it; and he set about nurturing and being a mentor for her.
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Well, her parent's--her mother and step-father--weren't about to let her out of their sight. So they sort of joined on as well, and traveled on the bus with Lena as the band toured.
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It wasn't easy touring with a black orchestra in the 1930's.
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The, you know, accommodations were limited; they um, very often there were no hotels that would take them, they roomed with, you know, with families.
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It was a difficult experience. And having, for Lena, having her parents along didn't make things any better.
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Her parents squabbled quite a bit.
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Um, they got unhappy with just how prominent, or not prominent, a role they thought she had with Noble Sissle, and were sort of pressuring him to, you know, to do more with her.
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Eventually, um, Noble Sissle sort of ejected her step-father from the tour.
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And Lena was able, later on, to also sort of ditch her mother.
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And make, uh, spend Christmas in 1936, with her father in Pittsburgh.
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He had come back into her life when she was performing with Noble Sissle's Orchestra in the mid-west.
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And during that time, at home--in Pittsburgh, in his home--in 1936, she renewed a friendship with a young man that had- she had met with, when he had been traveling with her father earlier.
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And his name was, Lewis Jones.
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Uh, they had a very, uh, quick and, you know; quick romance, and got married very quickly.
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Um, everyone was concerned that the marriage wasn't, you know, wasn't going to last; but they were in love and they weren't going to listen to, you know, to anyone uh, trying to dissuade them.
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Uh, within a year their first child was born. But the marriage was just, um, it was really difficult from the start.
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Uh, her husband expected her to be a homemaker, and stay home; and not be on the road, and not be involved in show business, particularly.
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Uh, he wasn't making very much money, and she was used to a lot more income; as a result of her professional career.
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So, the marriage was, you know, was not terribly sound.
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She had an opportunity to put in an appearance, just in a featured role, in an independently produced Hollywood film.
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And so she went out to Hollywood to do that. The film was called, 'The Duke is Tops'.
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And when she got out there, the production was delayed; so she was away longer than she expected.
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She came back, she and her husband tried to reconcile; they had a second child. A son.
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But it was pretty clear that the marriage wasn't going to endure.
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And so, at the age of twenty-three, with two young children to support, she was back in New York looking for work.
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She was hired by Charlie Barnett, who was a white band leader. He heard her perform at- during a- saw her during a audition for a benefit performance at the Apollo Theater.
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And it was quite a bold move for white band leader to bring on a--as a featured and principal vocalist--an African American Woman.
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Uh, Barnett had had black musicians--a few of them in his band--before, but to have Lena as the featured vocalist was a major move.
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When they traveled, the band did everything it could to make things easier for Lena.
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But often times the, again, accommodations were a challenge.
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And when the band did an extended tour through the south, Charlie urged her to take the time off; he knew how hard it would be for her to remain with the orchestra while they traveled.
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It wasn't very long before she had an opportunity to go on the night club circuit.
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And she was recruited for Cafe Society; which was really the place in the Greenwich Village for elite performers.
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It was also a place- it was one of the few clubs, in fact, in New York that was completely integrated outside of Harlem.
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And it had on it's matchbook cover, it called itself, 'The Wrong Place, For The Right People'.
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That was where she got to know Paul Robeson, and a number of progressive forward thinking folks.
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And her time at Cafe Society was a time that she really treasured.
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She was able to have both of her children at home; in her grandparent's old home in Brooklyn.
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Her cousin came and stayed with them, and it was working out well.
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And then, an invitation came to go out to Hollywood, and perform at a--what was going to be--a brand new night club called, 'The Trocadero'.
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It had already signed up a great troop of performers; Catherine Dunham and her dance troop was going to be out there.
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Ethal Waters was going to be performing, Duke Ellington; all of the, you know, all of the things that would make it an attractive gig for Lena to consider, were there.
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She really debated about whether she should go to California.
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She was having such success at the Cafe Society cabaret; that the thought of pulling up stakes and moving to California was a difficult one for her.
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But many in New York, and those that she really--whose opinion she valued the most--said she should go.
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That California and Hollywood presented a wonderful opportunity for her; she could be a trail blazer for other performers.
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And this was just another example--or certainly one of the early examples--of other's encouraging her to do things because they felt it was going to be- she could be a role model, she could be the 'path breaker' for those that followed.
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It wasn't always necessarily what Lena wanted to do, but she felt that obligation to follow through.
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So she went out to California; got there, and found out that the fellow that was in charge of setting up this nightclub, had not been able to get all of the financing he needed.
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And by the time she got there, Catherine Dunham had pulled out. Duke Ellington had pulled out. Ethal Waters had pulled out.
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Everyone that she had been hoping to perform with was gone, and the nightclub was only a dream that didn't-