First Black Broadway Hit--"Shuffle Along"--at 100

Fredi Washington, Paul Robeson, Josephine Baker, and many others all had roles in the 1921 Broadway hit, Shuffle Along, the first Broadway hit written, composed and performed by African Americans. Author and teacher Caseen Gaines has a new book about this and other influential Black productions: Footnotes: The Black Artists Who Rewrote the Rules of the Great White Way.

Hazel Scott: "I sued and I won and I gave all the money to the NAACP"

Terrific article on Hazel Scott by biographer Karen Chilton. In 1950, Scott brought a successful lawsuit against a restaurant near Spokane, Washington, where she and a traveling companion had been denied service, the waitress told them, because they were Negroes.[fn]Hazel Scott Attorneys Score in Initial Round, Spokane Daily Chronicle, April 17, 1950.

Shirley Graham and the Fight against Global White Supremacy

Benjamin Talton reminds us about problematic US record on fighting global white supremacy. Cites "African American activists’ steadfast opposition to authoritarianism and white supremacy at home and abroad offer lessons for the U.S. government," especially Cold War dissenters like Shirley Graham and W.E.B. Du Bois.

Shirley Graham Getting Attention She has Long Deserved

Not only were parts of Shirley Graham's opera Tom-Tom performed last month, Boston's Castle of our Skins, producer of concerts and other cultural programming that celebrates Black excellence in classical music, just filled its inaugural Shirley Graham creative-in-residence position, which was awarded to