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Marian Anderson was an African-American contralto who sang opera as well as traditional American songs (including spirituals) and became one of the most celebrated singers of the twentieth century. German-American pianist Franz Rupp was her permanent accompanist throughout most of her career (between 1940 & 1965).
As an African-American performer, Anderson faced much racism, including the 1939 refusal of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) to allow Anderson to sing for an integrated audience in Constitution Hall — resulting in Eleanor and Franklin D. Roosevelt to arrange for the singer to have an open-air concert on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. on Easter Sunday of 1939. Anderson broke other barriers, including becoming the first black person to perform at the Metropolitan Opera in 1955.
In addition to her work as a performer, Anderson worked for human rights, including as a delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Committee and participating in the civil rights movement in the 1960s. She did sing at the March on Washington in 1963.
Among the awards Anderson won: the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Kennedy Center Honors, and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
Her autobiography, My Lord, What A Morning, was published just after her appearance at the Met.
Via Deanna Dahlsad
"Yeah, I'll have a couple Dempseys and one of those Ted Williams' ones...for a friend". These sports-branded condoms are up for auction,
Via Gracie Passette
Most of us know of, if have not seen, the naked and hairy Burt Reynolds centerfold in Cosmo. (It was the 70's equivalent of a sex tape in terms of exploding a celebs popularity.) But have you seen ...
Via Gracie Passette
The homely, jowly face, dictatorial blatherings, and ragged leather chaps masked one of the great makers of modern cinema
Via Gracie Passette
Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, who later became Edward VII of the United Kingdom, had an interest in women which is notable even by the promiscuous standards of noblemen. Naturally, among his dalliances were a plethora of professionals, among them Skittles and La Belle Otero. His first semi-official mistress was Lillie Langtry, whom we discussed in May; today I’ll introduce you to the last (and longest-lasting) lady to hold that position, from three years before his coronation until the day he died. She had a number of things in common with Lillie: an ability to get along with their royal patron’s wife, Princess (later queen) Alexandra; a gift for discretion so highly-developed that many people to this day don’t realize (or else deny) that they were whores; and most importantly, a similar motive for taking up the profession.
Via Gracie Passette
The world heard the news at the beginning of 2003. The events had happened nearly eighty years previously but the abdication of King Edward Vlll, to marry his mistress Wallis Simpson, was still scandalous news. This time, the newspapers were telling us tha...
Via Gracie Passette
Dr. Maya Angelou, American Poet Laureate, most famous for authoring I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, passed away at age 86 on May 28th, 2014. Her literary agent Helen Brann confirmed the news to press, and thus began a worldwide outpouring of grief. The top trending tag on Twitter was “RIP Maya Angelou” and,…
Via Gracie Passette
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Rescooped by
Skuuppilehdet
from Kitsch
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When Alyssa Milano was on The Late Late Show last December, she told Craig Ferguson (and all of us watching), that her grandfather said there were two types of people: those who think farts are funny, and those who don’t.
Via Deanna Dahlsad
updownsmilefrown:
“James Dean during the filming of Giant (1956)
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fair-oaks-antiques:
“Vintage Glossy 8 x 10 Photo Mutiny In The Big House Monogram Pictures Corp Men In Drag Crossdressing Movie Memorabilia
”
Via Deanna Dahlsad, Gracie Passette
Luise Rainer, the luminous 1930s actress who won two consecutive Oscars but whose Hollywood film career was shattered when she went toe-to-toe with Louis B. Mayer, and lost, has died. She was 104.
Via Deanna Dahlsad
Sixties art house erotica was provocative, but was it a turn on?
Listen to Episode 104 of Slate’s The Gist: Subscribe in iTunes ∙ RSS feed ∙ Download ∙ Play in another tab Today on The Gist, we talk about Andy Warhol’s erotic films with McGill University professor Ara Osterweil, who explains how movies like Couch and Blow Job transformed American visual culture. Osterweil is the author...
Via Gracie Passette
whiteteen:
“ Salvador Dali drawing a penis on the forehead of a woman and signing it with Picasso’s signature
”
Via Gracie Passette
... Pinup Photography's Golden Era. The gentle art of pinup photography has been interpreted in a few different ways, first as enjoyable smut, then as kitsch, finally as a postfeminist emancipation...
Via Gracie Passette
Paris 1984: The old lady made her painful way up the stairs to her tiny, squalid apartment. Although it was the summer, she was cold; she was always cold.
She doubted that she had long for this world, she’d been born with the century.
Everything she owned, mostly mementoes from the past, was kept in a battered tin trunk. She lived on charity now but once she had been wealthy and the most famous woman in France. Now, no-one knew her name.
Oh, the parties she’d attended. The acclaim...
Via Gracie Passette
kurgankamargkhan:
“ The Ladybirds : The world’s first all-girl topless band !
”
Via Gracie Passette
Dorothy Stratten was the focus of the dreams and ambitions of three men. One killed her.
“The major reason that I’m … that we’re both sittin’ here,” says Hefner, “that I wanted to talk about it, is because there is still a great tendency … for this thing to fall into the classic cliché of ‘smalltown girl comes to Playboy, comes to Hollywood, life in the fast lane,’ and that was somehow related to her death. And that is not what really happened. A very sick guy saw his meal ticket and his connection to power, whatever, slipping away. And it was that that made him kill her.”
Via Deanna Dahlsad, Gracie Passette
A survey of the bronzed men’s bodies that graced our magazine’s pages in the 90s.
Via Gracie Passette
We've heard stories about our country's leaders, both real and false. In our times, it's hard to consume news without running into some scandal or another.
Via Gracie Passette
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