Racism

Famed soprano Camille D'Arville, popular vocalist Belle Davis billed as "The Southern Song Queen With Her Pickaninnies" and others play the fourth night of a week at The Orpheum Theatre, San Francisco, Californika, USA.

Famed soprano Camille D'Arville, popular vocalist Belle Davis billed as "The Southern Song Queen With Her Pickaninnies" and others play the fifth night of a week at The Orpheum Theatre, San Francisco, Californika, USA.

Clarice Vance, billed as "The Best Singer Of Coon Songs", plays at The Palace Theatre, New York City, USA.

The Trocadero Quartette present "Their black-face character creation - The Telephone Agent" during a week at Chase's Theatre, Washington DC, USA. Also on the bill are The Hungarian Gypsy Band, "comedy trick violinist" Chevriel and "The Dainty Singing And Dancing Comedienne" Kitty Fox Allen.

The Trocadero Quartette present "Their black-face character creation - The Telephone Agent" during a week at Chase's Theatre, Washington DC, USA. Also on the bill are The Hungarian Gypsy Band, "comedy trick violinist" Chevriel and "The Dainty Singing And Dancing Comedienne" Kitty Fox Allen.

The Black Patti Troubadours play at The California Theatre, San Francisco, California, USA. The Black Patti is a popular nickname for African-American soprano Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones, who found the 'Black Patti' identity and the coon songs and minstrel tunes associated with it, extremely distasteful.

Wilson's Juvenile Minstrels open at Sutton's Family Theater, Butte, Montana, USA.

Williams And Walker are starring in their musical show Sons Of Ham at The California Theatre, San Francisco, California, USA. (A popular song and dance duo, Bert Williams and George Walker are often cited as the first African-American superstars.)

Blackface minstrel entertainer Lew Sully is appearing at The Orpheum Theatre, San Francisco, California, USA. Also on the bill is Mlle. Chester with her "$10,000 Statue Dog".

Blackface minstrel entertainer Lew Sully is appearing at The Orpheum Theatre, San Francisco, California, USA. Also on the bill is Mlle. Chester with her "$10,000 Statue Dog".

William H. West's Big Minstrel Jubilee plays at The California Theatre, San Francisco, California, USA.

Sam Devere's Company presents a show described as "Refined Vaudeville and Extravaganza" at The Dewey Theatre, Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA.

Black-face comedian Louis Baldwin, of the musical duo Coburn And Baldwin, dies aged 40 in Bloomington, Illinois, USA.

Hi Henry's Minstrels are playing at The Grand Theatre, Atlanta, Georgia, USA.

In Old Kentucky is presented at The Boston Theatre, Boston, Massachusetts, USA. The show features a "Pickaninny Brass Band" and is described as "The Frolic Of The Inimitable Pickanannies In Southern Songs And Plantation Dances".

Blackface vaudeville comedian Billy Golden records Turkey In The Straw for Columbia Records in the USA.

Lew Dockstader's Minstrels are playing at The Victoria Theatre, Broadway, New York City, USA.

Vocal duo Collins And Harlan record Bake Dat Chicken Pie for Victor Records in New York City, USA. The first line, "If you wanna make a nigger feel good, I'll tell you what to do" is indicative of the racist tone of the song.

The William C. Cushman Co (a minstrel troupe) plays at Whitley Opera House, Emporia, Kansas, USA.

Local troupe The College Minstrels play at Whitley Opera House, Emporia, Kansas, USA.

A United Press syndicated feature reports that four girls in San Francisco, California, USA, were recently asked to dance the Bunny Hug in front of a local censor board. As a result, the board deemed the dance too risqué and banned it at dances - along with the Grizzly Bear and the Texas Tommy.

The Primrose And Dockstader Minstrels play the last of five nights at The Belasco Theatre, Washington CD, USA.

Florence Greenberg is born in New Jersey, USA. She will achieve success as a record label owner, music executive and record producer. Greenberg will found and own Tiara Records, Scepter Records, Hob Records and Wand Records. She will become best known for her work with several popular singers in the 60s including Dionne Warwick, The Shirelles, Tammi Terrell, Chuck Jackson, B.J. Thomas and others. She will also become active in the Civil Rights movement.

Flageolet player Thaddeus Peck records Old Black Joe for Victor Records in Camden, New Jersey, USA.

Ernest Krenek's opera Johnny Strikes Up The Band [Jonny Spielt Auf] opens in Vienna, Austria, Europe. It will outrage the Nazi right wing in Austria and Germany because the central character, Johnny, is an American negro jazz fiddler who emerges as the winner in a combat between traditional and modern music.

Les Hite And His Orchestra play at The Chatterbox, Mountainside, New Jersey, USA, during an extended engagement . Hite's band are the first black musicians to have played at this venue.

Les Hite And His Orchestra play at The Chatterbox, Mountainside, New Jersey, USA, during an extended engagement . Hite's band are the first black musicians to have played at this venue.

When The Biggest Show For 1951, starring Nat King Cole, Duke Ellington and Sarah Vaughan, plays at The City Auditorium, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, black fans are told they must enter the venue by a side door. The Baltimore Afro-American newspaper reports that about 1,000 people tore up their tickets in protest but "more than 4,000 crowded in to see and hear Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughan and Nat (King) Cole" and "there were 1,500 white record fans with a great big section all to themselves."

Fourteen year old black boy Emmett Till is abducted, brutally murdered and thrown into the Tallahatchie River after allegedly flirting with a white woman in Greenwood, Mississippi, USA. Tens of thousands will attend his funeral or view his casket, and images of his mutilated body will be published in black magazines and newspapers, rallying popular black support and white sympathy across the USA. Bob Dylan will tell the story in his 1962 song The Death Of Emmett Till. There is also an earlier song, called The Death Of Emmett Till, written by distinguished Los Angeles community leader Ms. A. C. Bilbrew, and recorded in 1955 by The Ramparts for the Los Angeles doo-wop label, Dootone.

Members of the Lumbee Native American tribe break up a rally of racist KKK (Ku Klux Klan) members at Maxton Field, North Carolina, USA. Later in the year, this clash of cultures will inspire the song The Battle Of Maxton Field by prolific songwriter Malvina Reynolds.

Oscar Brown Jr. is playing at The Village Vanguard, Greenwich Village, New York City, USA.

Duke Ellington And His Orchestra, with the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra, record Non-Violent Integration, in Hamburg, Germany, Europe, for Reprise Records.

Trini Lopez releases a new single, If I Had A Hammer, on Reprise Records in the USA. The song is a Civil Rights freedom song composed by Pete Seeger and Lee Hays of The Weavers.

The New Christy Minstrels, The Big 3, Leon Bibb, Will Holt and The Dukes Of Dixieland play at Fordham University, The Bronx, New York City, USA.

During a concert at Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts, USA, Louis Armstrong spontaneously plays a rendition of God Bless America, in tribute to the recently assassinated President Kennedy.

Three young civil rights workers - James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner - are murdered near Philadelphia, Nashoba County, Mississippi, USA. While investigating the burning of a black church, they had been arrested by the police, then released after dark into the hands of the Ku Klux Klan, who beat and murdered them. The story is told in the song He Was My Brother by Simon And Garfunkel.

The Bill Evans Trio comes to the end of twenty nights at The Cafe Au Go Go, Greenwich Village, New York City, USA, with Oscar Brown Jr.

The Black And White Minstrel Show is playing during a season at Victoria Palace Theatre, London, England, UK, Europe.

In a school questionnaire, 17-year-old Billy Joel states that, among other things, he likes "good music, New York City, pretty girls and Chinese food". He also says he hates "loud-voiced people, phony people, prejudiced people" and declares that Nat King Cole was the best "swinger of popular music." Among his other answers, he reveals that he wants to know "why Negroes are persecuted" and that when he grows up "I want to be successful."

An article in the New York Times tells the story of a secret jail hidden inside a tobacco barn in Alexandra, Virginia, USA. The jail was used to incarcerate slaves in dreadful conditions from 1790 onwards. In later years, the owner of the farm always told his children never to go into the barn, but never told them why. Tom Waits will read the story and it will inspire his 2004 song Don't Go Into The Barn.

A Florida, USA, judge convicts Michael Dunn on four charges related to his shooting into an SUV full of African-American teenagers in Jacksonville, Florida, but does not decide on the most serious charge — the murder of Jordan Davis, an occupant of the car. The shooting had followed after an argument over loud music.

When Ted Nugent headlines Waterfest in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, USA, he launches into an onstage stream of invective against US President Obama, claiming, among other slurs, that, "he hates you. He hates hunting, he hates guns, he hates freedom. He hates people with an attitude."

Usher concludes his 28-date UR Experience Tour with a gig at The Tampa Bay Times Forum, Tampa, Florida, USA. At the show, he wears a T-shirt reading 'I can't breathe', which is a reference to the last words of Eric Garner, an unarmed black man killed in July after a white police officer placed him in a chokehold.

Lorde publishes a letter to her fans as an advert in the New Zealand Herald newspaper. The message thanks her fans "for believing in female musicians" and states that her Grammy nomination "belongs to you". Her letter/advert comes in the wake of criticism lodged against the 2018 Grammys for failing to recognise female artists, with Alessia Cara being the only woman to win a major award (for Best New Artist).