USA > New York > New York City > New York panorama : a comprehensive view of the metropolis > Part 15
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Although Harlem is the largest Negro community in the world, most
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of its restaurants, hotels, saloons and retail shops are owned by Greek ts Germans, Jews, Italians, Irish, and other white groups. In business, mo than in any other field, the Harlem Negro has shown a lack of initiati lys
that puts Harlem in sharp contrast with many Negro communities throug out the country. Negro boys and girls are rarely employed as clerks Harlem stores, but work downtown as maids, porters, elevator and errar boys. Most of Harlem's Negro-owned businesses are in the field of pe sonal service. The community contains more than 2,000 Negro barb shops and "beauty parlors." On the other hand, Harlem has proved B
d. haven for the professional class, which numbers about 5,000. Physicia and dentists are especially numerous.
Catering to the inner man is one of Harlem's chief industries, and ea ing-places are to be found everywhere throughout the district. These ran from tiny Negro-owned restaurants in private homes and basements large chain-cafeterias controlled by white capital and the cafes and ca arets that play a prominent part in New York's night life. Prominent this field are Father Divine's 15 restaurants, where a meal featuring chick or chops is served for 15 cents.
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During the Prohibition era, many of the Negro-owned saloons pass into Italian hands, and remained open in spite of the law. Most of Ha lem's saloons are still Italian-owned; but some of the better known ta eet doe rooms and cabarets are conducted by Negroes.
Playing the central role in the life of the Harlem Negro is not tl cabaret or cafe, as is commonly supposed, but the church. Thousands the early southern migrants met for religious services in apartments ar homes. Later they purchased the existing churches of white Baptists, Met odists, Episcopalians and Presbyterians in the Harlem region. The actu surrender of a white church to Negroes was done with something a proaching ritual: a joint service would be held at which the out-goir white congregation would welcome the in-coming black. sss ha
It is difficult to say which is the more numerous of Harlem's two large religious sects, the Baptists or the Divinists. The Baptists have the large churches, such as the Abyssinia and Mt. Olivet, but it is possible th Father Divine has more followers in his many "Heavens" throughout tl city. There are two general types of churches in Harlem: the conventiona which embraces the long-established organizations, including the Metho
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dea c ist, Baptist, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Congregationalist; and the u conventional, consisting of the tabernacles of "prophets," the "storefron meeting places, the synagogues of Black Jews, and the houses of vario
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's and cults. The "Church of the Believers of the Commandments" may across the street from a Daddy Grace "House of Prayer." The "Meta- sical Church of Divine Investigation" may be a few doors from the ck Jews' "Commandment Keepers." Add to these the Moorish Temples, er Josephine Becton's churches, the tabernacles of Prophet Costonie, "Heavens" of Father Divine, and the sanctuaries of Mother Horne, il some conception of Harlem's many diverse religions and cults may be 1.
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Because of its highly sensitive social and political temper, Harlem has en termed the "focal point in the struggle for the liberation of the Negro ople." It was but natural that the long effort to free the Scottsboro boys uld begin in Harlem, and the greatest demonstration in connection with release of four of them occurred when thousands of Negroes jammed Pennsylvania Station to welcome them to New York. During Italy's asion of Ethiopia, anything concerning Italy on the movie screen ought forth immediate hisses and catcalls. In the consciousness of this pressed community, current events are commonly interpreted as gains set-backs for the Negro people. This social restlessness results in many blic demonstrations. Harlemites in increasing numbers attend street etings protesting evictions ; picket stores to compel the hiring of Ne- bes, or WPA offices to indicate disapproval of cuts in pay or personnel; th rade against the subjection of colonial peoples, or to celebrate some new ic improvement; and march many miles in May Day demonstrations. Harlem's peculiar susceptibility to social and political propaganda is well an eth istrated in the case of Marcus Garvey, a West Indian, who for a few ars in the early 1920's was known as "provisional President of Africa." tuđ advocated the establishment of a Black Republic in Africa, and ap in eached racial chauvinism. As head of the Universal Negro Improvement sociation, Garvey was the first Negro leader in America to capture the agination of the masses, and no one else has so stirred the race con- ges pes ousness of the Negroes in New York and elsewhere. The Negro World, th ce powerful organ of his Universal Negro Improvement Association, th na! racted such contributors as Edgar Grey, Hubert Harrison and William rris to its pages. Garvey's financial manipulations in connection with his amship company, the Black Star Line, led to his downfall. He was in- cted by the Federal Government for using the mails to defraud, served a im in the Atlanta penitentiary, and was later deported.
The most serious rioting that Harlem has known occurred in the spring 1935, at a time when many of the white-owned business establishments
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on West 125th Street were being boycotted for their refusal to employ Nin groes. A leading figure in the attendant agitation was a person calliant himself Sufi Abdul Hamid, who in gaudy Egyptian uniform preached anit Semitism on the street corners and was regarded by Harlem's Jewish mdg chants as a "Black Hitler." On March 19 a Negro boy was caught stealin in one of the boycotted stores. Rumors immediately spread throughclio Harlem that the boy had been beaten and killed by the white proprietcd large crowds gathered in and near West 125th Street, and in spite police efforts an orgy of window-smashing and store-looting followed. in,
emphasized in the report of an investigating committee appointed Mayor La Guardia, the outbreak had its fundamental causes in the terribliv economic and social conditions prevailing in Harlem at the time.
When the Federal Emergency Relief Administration began operationlo it found a majority of Harlem's population on the verge of starvation, a:, E result of the depression and of an intensified discrimination that made ?. all but impossible for Negroes to find employment. Landlords, knowitnt that their tenants could not move to other neighborhoods, had raised remAn exorbitantly, and wholesale evictions followed. The FERA, with its su, cessors the Civil Works Administration and the Works Progress Admiluce istration, brought a new lease on life to Harlem's underprivileged. WPAvor monthly checks constitute a considerable part of the community life-blocura and white storekeepers are quick to join with Negro relief workers in påSit testing against any threats to their jobs. Today one notes a very decidigr lessening of the dangerous tension that pervaded Harlem in the dark wint ters of 1934 and 1935.
Although New York had had a few scattered Negro writers before thY time, what is sometimes termed the "literary renaissance" of Harlem datint from about 1925. The movement was in large part initiated by the publ cation of the Survey Graphic's special "Harlem Number" and of Alater Locke's interpretative anthology entitled The New Negro. A host Id young writers made their appearance in the middle and late 1920's, amoUn them Walter White, Eric Walrond, Rudolph Fisher, Jean Toomer, Clauen Mckay, Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, Wallace Thurman, Jessie Faste set, Nella Larsen, Zora Neale Hurston, George Schuyler and Arna Bctser temps. Confined almost exclusively to Harlem, this literary movement wodu notable in that for the first time the American Negro depicted his own lild with a wide and varied range of talent and feeling. For a few years Negllab writers created more than they ever have before or since that period. Joyc. 19 Ulysses influenced some of them; and even the gospel of Gertruto.
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Nin claimed a number of Negro adherents. Some members of the move- llient were apotheosized in Carl Van Vechten's Nigger Heaven, a novel ant New York read with avidity. The poetry of Mckay, Cullen and meghes expressed in new rhythms and beauty and vigor the bitterness alift despair of Negro life in America. Toomer, in Cane, sounded a new and hunc note in American prose; and Walter White, in The Fire in the Flint til Flight, dealt with the Negro's struggle in both South and North e inst the barriers of color. Jessie Fauset, Nella Larsen and Claude Mc- frequently depicted Harlem life in their novels. James Weldon John- , long a Harlem resident, and later a professor at Fisk and New York riffiversities, elaborated in Black Manhattan the description of Harlem : was a prominent feature of his earlier Autobiography of an Ex- ionored Man. Rudolph Fisher, Wallace Thurman, George Schuyler and as E. B. Du Bois wove fantasy and satire into their descriptions of Negro de
. With the beginning of the national depression in 1929, the move- witt largely disintegrated.
refAmong the Negro artists of Harlem are Augusta Savage, Aaron Doug- Richmond Barthe, Charles Alston, E. Sims Campbell, Vertis Hayes, mifice Nugent, Henry W. Barnham, Sara Murrell, Romare Beardon, Robert PAon Pious, and Beauford Delaney. Of these Aaron Douglas, painter and ooral artist, Richmond Barthe, sculptor, Augusta Savage, sculptress, and prfSims Campbell, painter and cartoonist, are the most prominent. Many idegro artists are employed on the Federal Art Project, under whose direc- wij they have executed murals for the new wing of the Harlem Municipal spital. Harlem now boasts of 15 art centers, in churches, the Y.M.C.A., th Y.W.C.A., and neighborhood houses, where classes are conducted in latinting, ceramics, carving and sculpture. Best known for its exhibitions is ub Uptown Art Laboratory. The Federal Art Project in New York has dis- lajered an immense amount of latent artistic talent among the Negro t dldren of Harlem.
hoJntil very recently the doors of the American theater have not been augen to the Negro playwright, who has therefore had no opportunity to Faster the technique of the stage. Only in rare instances have producers Bolsented plays written by Negroes. Willis Richardson's one-act plays were w duced in some of the little and commercial theaters; and in 1925, Gar- lind Anderson's Appearances ran in the Frolic Theatre. Wallace Thurman egi aborated on Lulu Belle and Harlem, both well known on Broadway. yce 1937, Langston Hughes entered the field of the drama with his Mu- ruto. The Krigwa Players were pioneers in the little theater movement.
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Today Harlem's thespians are for the most part associated with the Nu Theater League and the Federal Theatre Project.
Prominent among those plays written by whites in which Negro acta have had an opportunity to depict the lives of their people are Eugen O'Neill's The Emperor Jones and All God's Chillun Got Wings, produd! in 1920 and 1924; Edward Sheldon and Charles MacArthur's Lulu Be P which opened in New York in 1926; Paul Green's Pulitzer Prize pip In Abraham's Bosom, produced in 1926 at the Provincetown Playhouit Marc Connelly's The Green Pastures, which started in 1929 on its 1cha career of sensational success; and Paul Peters' and George Sklar's Stem dore, first presented in 1930.
New York, like Boston, Philadelphia and Chicago, has its celebra music schools and opportunities for musical expression, which have lar ways attracted Negro artists. The successes of Hall Johnson, Roland Haus Paul Robeson, Jules Bledsoe and Marian Anderson are nationally knoleg Many of Harlem's Negro musical artists are now associated with the FT eral Music Project.
Of all the popular personalities whom Harlem has shared with Anch ica, Bill "Bojangles" Robinson has evoked the most lasting and gentleg affection. As the world's ace tap dancer, he has appeared on the stagelet screen of every city and town in this country, and has earned a reputat as a philanthropist in his private life. In 1934, he was elected "unoffilat mayor" of Harlem.
By adoption, Harlem claims the Negro show girl, Josephine Baker, vin came out of the slums of St. Louis and earned the title of "Empilest Josephine" during her stay in Paris in 1931 with the "Dixie Steppelo a company that had begun by touring the South in a series of one-nit t stands. She became a European celebrity as star of the Folies Bergère, tot married Count Pepito De Albertini. ans
The late Richard B. Harrison, whose theatrical career knew only ride role, made his debut at the age of 66 and achieved the greatest fame H any Negro actor. His life was closely bound up with "De Lawd" of Midis Connelly's play, The Green Pastures, and little is recorded of his earle career. When the play was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1930, Lieuter she Governor Herbert Lehman presented "De Lawd" with the Spingarn moat at the Mansfield Theater before an enthusiastic audience. In 1936, the rian tire nation mourned the death of the man who "brought God to Brdit way." ham
Florence Mills, who ranks as one of America's greatest musical comraz
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Nes, came to New York after a Chicago cabaret career, and was featured Paul Slavin at the Plantation Cafe. She made her first Broadway ap- acarance in the popular Shuffle Along, and achieved her first European ug mph in Dixie to Broadway. She died in 1927, shortly after a success- du European tour in Blackbirds.
Be Paul Robeson, a graduate of Rutgers College who achieved national poutation in his student days as a football star, made his first appearance 0 the professional stage in Mary Hoyt Wiborg's Taboo. Later he replaced arles Gilpin in Roseanne, and in 1924 he became a national figure in the Stegnerican theater by starring in Eugene O'Neill's All God's Chillun Got ings. After appearing in Show Boat in London, he played the title role O'Neill's Emperor Jones in Berlin in 1930. In 1926 he appeared as the ve r of Jim Tully's Black Boy. He has sung and acted throughout Europe, lars played prominent roles in many motion pictures, and is the outstanding nodegro actor of today.
Though Negroes are considered to be an exceptionally musical people, urlem's general interest in music is largely limited to those popular jazz Anchestras that originated within its boundaries. Some of the greatest of nulegro bands-Will Vodery's, Leroy Smith's, Duke Ellington's and gejetcher Henderson's-acquired their initial fame in downtown New York. tat was through their often startling innovations in jazz and swing music flat Negro orchestra leaders held sway. Whether it was jazz as it was azzed" by Cab Calloway in the 1920's, or swing as it was "swung" by ønmie Lunceford in the 1930's, the white popular jazz and swing or- prestras took most of their cues from Harlem orchestras and their Ne- pero leaders. Most of the prominent Negro bands have reached a large pub- nij through their phonograph recordings, and Negro band-members are ,dotected by the powerful Local 802 of the American Federation of Musi- ins, affiliated with the American Federation of Labor-though there are idences of discrimination against Negroes in the matter of wages.
ne Harlem's boast that it is an area where new dance steps are created is Mdisputable. Just who initiated the "truck" is not known. Cora La Redd of arle Cotton Club, "Rubber Legs" Williams, Chuck Robinson, and Bilo and enshes have all put forward their individual claims. It is interesting to note nejat there are many kinds of "trucking,"-the "picket's truck," the "poli- le ian's truck," the "Park Avenue truck," the "Mae West truck," and the roHitler truck." Among other contemporary Harlem dances is the "shim- am," a time-step featuring the "break" with a momentary pause; and the mazzle-dazzle," which involves a rhythmic clapping of hands and a rolling
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of hips. The riotous "Lindy Hop" is a flying dance done by couples which a girl is thrown away in the midst of a lightning two-step, thud rudely snatched back to be subjected to a series of twists, jerks, dips a.f.n scrambles. All of these and many more can be seen in Harlem's dance halle at house parties, on beaches, and in the streets in summer to the tune WPA Music Project bands.
There is but one legitimate theater in Harlem, the Lafayette, upon whoa stage the greater part of Harlem's theatrical tradition was made. For year the Lafayette was the home of the Lafayette Stock Company; and togetl. with the Lincoln Theater, home of the Anita Bush Company, it cater to Harlem's smart set. Andrew Bishop, Inez Clough, Rose McClendc Abbie Mitchell, Anita Bush, Laura Bowman and Leigh Whipper weda among the most popular of Harlem's matinee idols. ha
Gradually the Lafayette's legitimate drama gave way to vaudeville movies replaced vaudeville, and finally in 1935 the house closed its dockdi altogether. In 1936, the Federal Theatre, working with a Negro calay opened the Lafayette again to legitimate drama, producing Frank Wilsone Walk Together Chillun, Rudolph Fisher's The Conjure Man Dies, a: Orson Welles' production of Macbeth, which attracted national attenti uts because of its Haitian locale and unusual interpretation by Negro acto Macbeth was followed by Gus Smith's and Peter Morrell's Turpentines Carlton Moss's adaptation of Obey's Noah, George Kelly's The Show On George McEntee's The Case of Phillip Lawrence, Dorothy Hailperros Horse Play, four of Eugene O'Neill's one-act plays of the sea, and W. o liam Du Bois' Haiti.
A number of prominent motion picture actors have come from or bella associated with Harlem-notably Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, who has akur peared with Will Rogers, Shirley Temple, and other screen favorites. ES ginning in 1910, before the industry moved to Hollywood, West JenkiMe appeared in many pictures over a period of years. The cast for King Vil or's Hallelujah was entirely recruited and organized in Harlem, then trar. g ported to Los Angeles. Nina Mae Mckinney, star of the picture, was Harlem chorus girl. The first effort of Negroes to produce their own pit tures was made by the Micheaux Corporation of Harlem, which has mo" than 30 pictures to its credit. the
Negroes have participated in sports and athletics in New York sink 1800. Tom Molyneaux, a Negro ex-slave who became champion boxer 1809, made the old Catherine Market his headquarters. Almost all tl Negro boxing champions and near champions-Joe Jeanette, Sam Lan
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es:d, Joe Gans, Tiger Flowers, Battling Siki, Jack Johnson, Harry Wills, thad Kid Chocolate-lived for most of their fighting careers in New York. sanada Lee, now an actor, and Buddy Saunders were born in New York. hal e Louis, the present heavyweight champion, is an adopted citizen of ne rlem.
The most popular of Harlem sports is basketball, and during the long hotson various expert Negro teams, among them the famous Renaissance yes intet, provide entertainment for many thousands. The sporting con- etllousness of Harlem is evidenced by the huge Negro attendance at base- tera11 games in the Yankee Stadium and at the Polo Grounds. Thousands ac- dokuimed John Woodruff, Jesse Owens, Eulace Peacock and Cornelius John- weh when they broke world records at the new Randall's Island Stadium; d other Negroes have been prominent in New York track meets from ville days of Howard Drew down to Ben Johnson. Bicycling and horseback odling are popular among the theatrical and sporting sets, while golf is Caf ayed to some extent. Cricket is popular among the West Indians, who ore so adept that they meet many of the world's leading teams.
For the most part, Harlem gains its knowledge of current events in the tigtside world from the Negro weeklies of New York and other large tories rather than from the metropolitan dailies. The leading Negro week- fines published in New York are the New York Age, a Republican journal ofich under this and various other names has appeared continuously since 380; the Amsterdam News, a supporter of the New Deal; and the New work News, which is widely read among Father Divine's followers.
Harlem's best known and most widely used library is the 135th Street edanch of the New York Public Library, which houses the famous Schom- atrg Collection of material relating to Negro life. This collection is the Bsult of 30 years of research by Arthur Schomburg in the United States, ifentral and South America, the West Indies, Haiti and Europe. It com- idises more than 8,000 volumes and 1,500 manuscripts, numerous engrav- gs and specimens of primitive African art.
S The community's facilities for public education are woefully inadequate. Ithough the population of Harlem has more than tripled since the World Tar, not one new school building was constructed in this region during e post-war period until 1937. Many of the buildings are antiquated fire- ndaps, without playgrounds or auditoriums. In one school, lunch is served 1,000 children in a room designed to seat only 175. There are no spe- Halized or nursery schools, and because of discriminatory zoning Negro ludents are not permitted to attend newer and better-equipped schools in
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adjacent areas. According to Mayor La Guardia's Commission on Con d tions in Harlem, one of the contributing factors in connection with t rioting of March 1935 was the deplorable conditions prevailing in t. public schools.
Harlem's importance in New York politics has grown along with
increase in population. In 1897, Tammany Hall gained dominance over tl Negro vote through "Chief" Lee, a noted Negro leader, and until recent it has retained control by dispensing political patronage. Of the nine N groes elected as New York aldermen, seven have been Democrats and tv ca T
Republicans. But because of the depression, increasing economic and raci discrimination, displacement in jobs, and the rise of workers' organiz in, tions, thousands of Negro voters have deserted the two older parties join or support the Labor, Socialist, or Communist groups.
50 Histi In 1920, Harlem elected its first Negro alderman, George Harris, tat Ne Independent Republican. To maintain its prestige among the Negroe Tammany in the following election ran a Negro candidate for alderman, ar regularly since then Harlem has been represented in the Board of Alde men. When the Tenth Municipal District was created in 1930, two Negi fru attorneys, James S. Watson and Charles E. Toney, were elected judge
b The recent appointments of Myles A. Paige as city magistrate, of Hube Delany as commissioner of taxes and assessments, and of Eunice Huntc, Carter and Ellis Rivers to District Attorney Dewey's staff have placed N ... groes in new and important fields of public service.
Legally, there is no racial discrimination in New York. Negroes wege not excluded from or segregated in vaudeville and legitimate theaters unng til the early 1920's. Some New York theaters practice discrimination bkil refusing to sell tickets to Negroes or by maintaining that all seats are solche others admit Negroes only to certain sections of the house. Except foet some of the "little cinemas," there has never been discrimination on this part of motion picture houses. ure
Twenty years ago only Negroes of unusual distinction would dare to asth for accommodations in downtown hotels. Gradually, however, the largeln hotels have become much more liberal in this respect. But discriminations in restaurants is still common. Of late, law suits have compelled manca restaurants to alter their policy, and today a Negro can eat in many dowrn town restaurants without being asked to sit behind a screen or without! finding that a cup of salt has been stirred into his soup. In some section of Harlem itself there are bars and cafes that discriminate against Negroes
For Pr ry ce
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d the windows of many rooming-houses carry the familiar southern sign: or White Only."
Present-day Negro organizations, both national and local, represent many rying schools of thought. Some advocate amalgamation, passive resist- ce, colonization, salvation through "art and joy"; others favor collec- e political and economic action on the part of white and black.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was ganized in May 1909, and in the following year Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois came its director of publicity and research and editor of its national or- n, The Crisis. In his words, the aim of the Association was to create "an ganization so effective and so powerful that when discrimination and in- stice touched one Negro, it would touch 12,000,000 ... an organization at would work ceaselessly to make Americans know that the so-called legro problem' is simply one phase of the vaster problem of democracy America, and that those who wish freedom and justice for their country ust wish it for every black citizen." The Association's militant legal uggle against segregation and for civil rights and its long fight against hching are now known throughout the country. In 1931, James Weldon hnson resigned as executive secretary of the Association and was suc- eded by Walter White.
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