The Whitman Sisters were four African-American sisters who were stars of
Black Vaudeville
Black Vaudeville was based on performances that came out of the movement and style of African Americans. The vaudeville years were the early 1880s until the early 1930s. These acts were unique on the vaudeville scene because the performers brough ...
. They ran their own performing touring company for over forty years from 1900 to 1943, becoming the longest-running and best-paid act on the
T.O.B.A. Theatre Owners Booking Association, or T.O.B.A., was the vaudeville circuit for African American performers in the 1920s. The theaters mostly had white owners, though there were exceptions, including the recently restored Morton Theater in Athens, ...
circuit. They comprised Mabel (May) (b.
Ohio
Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...
; 1880–1942), Essie (Essie Barbara Whitman; b.
Osceola, Arkansas
Osceola is a city in, and a dual county seat of, Mississippi County, Arkansas, Mississippi County, Arkansas, United States. Located along the Mississippi River within the Arkansas Delta, the settlement was founded in 1837 and incorporated in 1853. ...
, July 4, 1882 – May 7, 1963), Alberta "Bert" (b.
Kansas
Kansas () is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka, and its largest city is Wichita. Kansas is a landlocked state bordered by Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to the ...
; 1887–1964) and Alice (b.
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States
Georgia may also refer to:
Places
Historical states and entities
* Related to the ...
; 1900–December 29, 1968).
["Whitman Sisters (biography)"]
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...
[''Vaudeville old & new: an encyclopedia of variety performances in America, Volume 1'', ]
pp. 1199–1200
/ref>
History
The sisters were the daughters of Reverend Albery Allson Whitman
Albery Allson Whitman (May 30, 1851June 29, 1901 was an African-American poet, minister and orator. Born into slavery, Whitman became a writer. During his lifetime he was acclaimed as the "Poet Laureate of the Negro Race". He worked as a manual ...
and Caddie Whitman (), who lived in Ohio, Arkansas and Kansas before settling in Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...
. The sisters had an older brother, Caswell (1876–1936). Reverend A. A. Whitman came to be known as the "Poet Laureate of the Negro Race". The sisters were taught by their father to sing religious songs and to dance, in order to accompany him on evangelical tours.[
Around 1899, Mabel and Essie began performing as the Danzette Sisters (or "Daznette Sisters" by other sources).][ They were invited to perform in New York by ]George Walker George Walker may refer to:
Arts and letters
*George Walker (chess player) (1803–1879), English chess player and writer
*George Walker (composer) (1922–2018), American composer
* George Walker (illustrator) (1781–1856), author of ''The Cos ...
but their father and manager insisted that they stay to finish their education, and the sisters continued performing in the south. After their father died in 1901, Mabel, Essie and Alberta formed the Whitman Sisters' Novelty Act Company in Augusta, Georgia
Augusta ( ), officially Augusta–Richmond County, is a consolidated city-county on the central eastern border of the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. The city lies across the Savannah River from South Carolina at the head of its navig ...
, and the twelve-strong Whitman Sisters' New Orleans Troubadours in 1904. The sisters were light-complexioned – their mother may have been white – and were occasionally obliged to perform in blackface
Blackface is a form of theatrical makeup used predominantly by non-Black people to portray a caricature of a Black person.
In the United States, the practice became common during the 19th century and contributed to the spread of racial stereo ...
. They were described as "bright, pretty mulatto
(, ) is a racial classification to refer to people of mixed African and European ancestry. Its use is considered outdated and offensive in several languages, including English and Dutch, whereas in languages such as Spanish and Portuguese is ...
girls" with "wonderful voices". Alberta ("Bert") performed regularly as a male impersonator. They moved their base to Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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in 1905, and the youngest sister, Alice, joined the company around 1910.[ Mabel Whitman managed the company after her mother's death in 1909, and in 1910 organized Mabel Whitman and the Dixie Boys, and toured the US and (reputedly) Europe.][
Researcher ]Nadine George-Graves
Dr. Nadine George-Graves is the Chair of the Department of Dance and a Professor since 2018 in both that department and the Department of Theatre at The Ohio State University's Department of Dance and a member of the ''Dance Research Journal'' Edit ...
wrote that the sisters were the highest paid act in the Vaudeville circuit. While they claimed to have performed in England for King George V
George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until Death and state funeral of George V, his death in 1936.
Born duri ...
, George-Graves was not able to find evidence to support this. She wrote that "Many other actors started or advanced their careers with the Whitman Sisters' company. People of all races enjoyed their show. Even after Vaudeville was no longer in its prime, they continued to perform in theaters and churches around the nation and were admired by all types of audience members."[ George-Graves, Nadine. ''The Royalty of Negro Vaudeville: The Whitman Sisters and the Negotiation of Race, Gender and Class in African American Theatre, 1900–1940'', New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000.]
According to George-Graves, a typical show during their period of greatest popularity, from about 1909 to 1920, included " jubilee songs and coon shout
Coon songs were a genre of music that presented a stereotype of black people. They were popular in the United States and Australia from around 1880 to 1920, though the earliest such songs date from minstrel shows as far back as 1848, when they we ...
s, cakewalk
The cakewalk was a dance developed from the "prize walks" (dance contests with a cake awarded as the prize) held in the mid-19th century, generally at get-togethers on Black Slavery in the United States, slave plantations before and after End ...
s and breakdowns, comedians, midgets, cross-dressers, beautiful dancing girls, pickaninnies, a jazz band." Other notable performers in the company at various times included Leonard Reed
Leonard Reed (January 7, 1907 in Lightning Creek, Oklahoma – April 5, 2004 in West Covina, California) was an American tap dancer, co-creator with his partner, Willie Bryant, of the famous Shim Sham Shimmy (Goofus) tap dance routine.
He was s ...
, Willie Bryant
William Stevens Bryant (August 30, 1908 – February 9, 1964) was an American jazz bandleader, vocalist, and disc jockey, known as the "Mayor of Harlem".
Biography
Born in Chicago, Illinois, United States, while growing up he took trumpet l ...
, Jeni Le Gon
Jeni LeGon (born Jennie Ligon; August 14, 1916 – December 7, 2012), also credited as Jeni Le Gon, was an American dancer, dance instructor, and actress. She was one of the first African-American women to establish a solo career in tap da ...
, Count Basie
William James "Count" Basie (; August 21, 1904 – April 26, 1984) was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. In 1935, he formed the Count Basie Orchestra, and in 1936 took them to Chicago for a long engagement and the ...
, Lonnie Johnson, and Bill Robinson
Bill Robinson, nicknamed Bojangles (born Luther Robinson; May 25, 1878 – November 25, 1949), was an American tap dancer, actor, and singer, the best known and the most highly paid African-American entertainer in the United States during the f ...
.[
George-Graves wrote:]Mabel handled all the bookings, Essie designed and executed costumes, Alberta composed music, and Alice, having won cakewalk contests from a child, was billed at the star dancer. Their fast-paced shows, based on a variety format of songs, dances and comedy skits, included a chorus line and jazz band. Alberta cut her hair short, dressed as a man, and excelled as a male impersonator. A singer and flash dancer, "Bert" topped her Strut with high-kicking legomania
Eccentric dance is a style of dance performance in which the moves are unconventional and individualistic. It developed as a genre in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a result of the influence of African and exotic d ...
. Alice was the star of the show and billed as the "Queen of Taps," enhancing such popular dances as Ballin' the Jack
"Ballin' the Jack" (or sometimes "Balling the Jack") is a popular song from 1913 written by Jim Burris with music by Chris Smith. It introduced a popular dance of the same name with "Folks in Georgia's 'bout to go insane." It became a ragtime, pop ...
, Walkin' the Dog, and the Shim-Sham-Shimmy with clear and clean tapping. She was considered the best female tap dancer in the 1920s.
Essie retired from performing in 1926.[ After Mabel's death in Atlanta in 1942, the company effectively ceased to exist.][
]
Legacy
Despite their forty years of popularity, information about them all but disappeared. They left no film, nor sheet music, and close to no records, though Essie made some recordings for Black Swan
The black swan (''Cygnus atratus'') is a large waterbird, a species of swan which breeds mainly in the southeast and southwest regions of Australia. Within Australia, the black swan is nomadic, with erratic migration patterns dependent upon c ...
and Paramount
Paramount (from the word ''paramount'' meaning "above all others") may refer to:
Entertainment and music companies
* Paramount Global, also known simply as Paramount, an American mass media company formerly known as ViacomCBS. The following busin ...
in the early 1920s.[Essie Barbara Whitman, ''The Encyclopedia of Arkansas History & Culture'']
Retrieved 9 March 2018
The surviving sisters were interviewed in the 1960s by Jean and Marshall Stearns
Marshall Winslow Stearns (October 18, 1908 – December 18, 1966) was an American jazz critic and musicologist. He was the founder of the Institute of Jazz Studies.
Biography
Stearns was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Edith Baker Winslo ...
, who included a chapter about the Whitmans in their work ''Jazz Dance''. Their full role was uncovered by the efforts of African American Theater Studies scholar Nadine George-Graves, who analyzed a wealth of local and regional publications,[Erwin Bosman, "The Whitman Sisters: Why We May Never Silence Them"]
''NoDepression.com'', September 3, 2012. Retrieved 8 March 2018 and published her findings in 2000 as ''The Royalty of Negro Vaudeville: The Whitman Sisters and the Negotiation of Race, Gender and Class in African American Theatre, 1900–1940''.
After Essie retired from performing, she became a lay preacher in Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
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, subdivision_name ...
. She was married three times and died, aged 80, in a house fire in 1963.[ Alberta died in Atlanta in 1964, and Alice died in Chicago in 1968. Alice's son, Albert "Pops" Whitman (1919–1950), became a noted tap dancer in his own right.][
]
References
External links
The Whitman Sisters Archive
''NadineGeorgeGraves.com''
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Whitman Sisters
Vaudeville performers
Sibling quartets
19th-century American actresses
20th-century American actresses
American stage actresses
African-American actresses
American tap dancers
Burials at South-View Cemetery
20th-century African-American women
20th-century African-American people