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Speaker 1: Happy Saturday. Today we are sharing an episode from our predecessors,

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Speaker 1: Sarah and Deblina. Back in eleven, they talked about contralto

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Speaker 1: Marian Anderson, whose concert at the Lincoln Memorial made a

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Speaker 1: huge impression on the young Martin Luther King Jr. So enjoy.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how

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Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

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Speaker 1: I'm Sarah Dowdy and I'm Deblina Chuck Reboarding. And today

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Speaker 1: we're gonna be talking about a famous singer. But we're

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Speaker 1: gonna start by talking about a famous speech, one of

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Speaker 1: the most famous speeches in history. It took place August

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Speaker 1: nineteen sixty three. It's Martin Luther King's I Have a

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Speaker 1: Dream speech. Of course, that was made on the steps

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Speaker 1: of the Lincoln Memorial. But more than twenty years before that,

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Speaker 1: a ten year old Martin Luther King had been affected

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Speaker 1: by another Lincoln Memorial event, one that had been also

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Speaker 1: covered nationally broadcast coast to coast by NBC Radio, covered

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Speaker 1: in all the newspapers. Are a really big event, and

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Speaker 1: that was the concert of African American contralto singer Marian Anderson,

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Speaker 1: and she had opened her performance by singing America and

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Speaker 1: then Donna Zetti and Ave Maria and Spiritual is a

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Speaker 1: selection of spirituals to this utterly ecstatic crowd. They were

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Speaker 1: just thrilled to see her singing, an internationally renowned singer,

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Speaker 1: and see her sing there on the National Mall. Seventy

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Speaker 1: five thousand people were actually there, and that was the

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Speaker 1: largest group to gather at the Lincoln Memorial since Lindbergh's

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Speaker 1: appearance there in ninety. It was a huge event that

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Speaker 1: that concert was actually a result of earlier discrimination. The

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Speaker 1: Daughters of the American Revolution had refused to allow Anderson,

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Speaker 1: who was by that point an internationally acclaimed singer, to

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Speaker 1: perform at DC's Constitution Hall. So in protest, first Lady

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Speaker 1: Eleanor Roosevelt resigned from the d a R and arranged

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Speaker 1: an alternate venue for Anderson's performance, the National Mall. So

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Speaker 1: with a backstory like that, in a voice like Anderson's,

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Speaker 1: the Easter nineteen nine performance proved to be a landmark

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Speaker 1: moment for the early civil rights movement, and one that

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Speaker 1: undoubtedly affected young Martin Luther King. Yeah, we actually have

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Speaker 1: a quote from him at age fifteen, So just a

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Speaker 1: few years After this concert by Marian Anderson, Martin Luther

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Speaker 1: King entered a speaking contest, and he noted the performance

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Speaker 1: and the inequalities that it had yet to address. In

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Speaker 1: the speech, he wrote, here's what he had to say.

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Speaker 1: She's saying is never before with tears in her eyes

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Speaker 1: when the words of America and nobody knows the trouble

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Speaker 1: I've seen rang out over that great gathering. There was

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Speaker 1: a hush on the sea of uplifted faces, black and white,

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Speaker 1: and a new baptism of liberty, equality and fraternity. That

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Speaker 1: was a touching tribute. But miss Anderson may not as

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Speaker 1: yet spend the nine in any good hotel in America.

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Speaker 1: So who was Marian Anderson? How did she wind up

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Speaker 1: singing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in front

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Speaker 1: of this crowd of seventy thousand people? And what did

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Speaker 1: she think of her her sort of unwilling or reluctant

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Speaker 1: role as a civil rights figure. Well, we're gonna get

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Speaker 1: to that, but first we're gonna start with her childhood.

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Speaker 1: She was born in Philadelphia in eight and she was

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Speaker 1: the eldest of three girls. Her mother had trained as

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Speaker 1: a school teacher in Virginia and her father worked delivering

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Speaker 1: coal and ice, and Anderson started singing at a really

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Speaker 1: early age. She joined the junior choir of the Union

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Speaker 1: Baptist Church at age six, and she actually gotten trouble

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Speaker 1: back then because she would drown out all the other

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Speaker 1: kids in her class. So in class she'd said as

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Speaker 1: close as she could to the music room so that

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Speaker 1: she could overhear the songs being taught through the wall.

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Speaker 1: So really obsessed with music, she would when she finally

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Speaker 1: would get to music class from her her other studies,

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Speaker 1: she would already know all the songs. She would have

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Speaker 1: memorized as them already. But she was also interested in

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Speaker 1: piano and violin. She bought a used violin herself by

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Speaker 1: saving up money from scrubbing steps, and supposedly was not

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Speaker 1: very great at violin. She realized that was not her instrument,

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Speaker 1: but still practiced really hard at it. And this was

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Speaker 1: kind of an interesting time in classical music, one that

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Speaker 1: we need to discuss a little bit before we we

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Speaker 1: can really understand how Marian came to be what she was.

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Speaker 1: But it was a time that seemed a little more

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Speaker 1: welcoming to African Americans, time when classical music seemed a

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Speaker 1: little more accessible than it had in the past because

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Speaker 1: just a few years before Anderson was born, and tonin

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Speaker 1: Dvorgiacque had announced that African Americans would be able to

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Speaker 1: attend the National Conservatory free of admission. And he made

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Speaker 1: that decision because he thought that spirituals and American Indian

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Speaker 1: music was sort of the way that American composition was headed,

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Speaker 1: that would be the major influence in the future of

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Speaker 1: a Erican music. So he thought that people with fewer

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Speaker 1: privileges should be able to to train up to be

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Speaker 1: a part of that future. And Anderson certainly seemed like

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Speaker 1: she would be part of that future. She had promised.

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Speaker 1: She joined the People's course at Church of the Crucifixion

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Speaker 1: at age eight and had to stand on a chair

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Speaker 1: to see the conductor. So that's how young she was

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Speaker 1: compared to everyone else. And it was around this time

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Speaker 1: that paper started advertising her church concerts as shows by

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Speaker 1: quote the baby contralto. Yeah, and that was the first

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Speaker 1: little contralto nickname she had. But I think it's it's

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Speaker 1: funny to imagine an eight year old with a contralto.

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Speaker 1: In case anybody doesn't know, that's one of the lower

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Speaker 1: the lower registers for women singers. So imagine an eight

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Speaker 1: year old with a very powerful, slightly low voice, but

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Speaker 1: must have been surprising two people. Yeah, and impressive for

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Speaker 1: sure even then. But in nineteen o nine, Marian's family

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Speaker 1: sort of underwent some major trouble. Her father had a

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Speaker 1: head injury at work, and after a month of illness

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Speaker 1: related to this injury, he died at age thirty four,

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Speaker 1: and that left Marian's mother having to go back to work. Unfortunately,

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Speaker 1: she couldn't teach, even though that's what she had done

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Speaker 1: in Virginia, because she didn't have the proper certification to

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Speaker 1: teach in Pennsylvania. So she did laundry and cleaning and sewing,

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Speaker 1: and it also caused Marian to have to go to

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Speaker 1: work herself, drop out of high school and help support

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Speaker 1: the family. And she did that mostly with menial work

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Speaker 1: as well, helping out her mother with cleaning and and

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Speaker 1: stuff like that, but also occasionally taking on gig at

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Speaker 1: a small concert, something something to make a little money

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Speaker 1: off of her singing, and she got help with that too.

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Speaker 1: People who had heard her sing they weren't about to

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Speaker 1: let her slip off into a life of manual labor,

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Speaker 1: so she continued to sing with the People's Chorus and

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Speaker 1: Union Baptist Church, often filling in for soloists and sometimes

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Speaker 1: even helping fill out the tenor section. As Sarah indicated

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Speaker 1: before another another great example of her reign. She had

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Speaker 1: three octaves actually, so she could go from covering for

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Speaker 1: the tenor section to singing soprano. So she studied with

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Speaker 1: a teacher, Mary Saunders Patterson, who would often waive her

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Speaker 1: lesson fees, and she was supported by the Union Baptist

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Speaker 1: folks who basically took up a collection for her in

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Speaker 1: order to send her to school. Yeah, they wanted to

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Speaker 1: to see her go somewhere. They actually thought that her

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Speaker 1: voice was a gift from God and it shouldn't be wasted.

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Speaker 1: So you'd think that such a talented young woman who

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Speaker 1: was the pride of her community and had all of

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Speaker 1: these supporters would would be able to get into a conservatory,

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Speaker 1: be able to get some professional training. So, with money

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Speaker 1: in hand, she actually applied to a local conservatory in

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Speaker 1: nineteen fourteen, but had this terrible experience there. The receptionists

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Speaker 1: made her wait until everyone in line behind her had

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Speaker 1: been served, and then finally, when she was the last

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Speaker 1: person in the room, the woman told her we don't

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Speaker 1: take colored and dismissed her without even giving her a

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Speaker 1: chance to sing. But she still managed to continue her

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Speaker 1: train and even though she couldn't get into a school

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Speaker 1: like this, she went back to high school instead with

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Speaker 1: the support of our church. So she had that kind

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Speaker 1: of hoping that she'd be able to get a higher

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Speaker 1: paying day job eventually to continue her singing. And then

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Speaker 1: the churches Marian Anderson's Future Fund also helped her continue

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Speaker 1: funding these private lessons, and by the time she started

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Speaker 1: touring regionally, momentum around her was really really building. Finally, yeah,

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Speaker 1: we mentioned people from where she was locally collecting money

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Speaker 1: from her, but at a concert for the National Association

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Speaker 1: of Negro Musicians convention in Chicago, someone in the audience

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Speaker 1: actually called for a collection for her there too. She

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Speaker 1: eventually applied and was accepted to Yale, but she still

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Speaker 1: couldn't attend due to the price. Meanwhile, though, the principle

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Speaker 1: of her high school, Dr. Lucy Wilson, kept working with

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Speaker 1: Marian and introduced her to Giuseppe Boghetti, a well known

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Speaker 1: voice teacher, and he remembers their first meeting in this

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Speaker 1: way quote at the end of a long, hard day

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Speaker 1: when I was weary of singing and singers, and when

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Speaker 1: a tall, calm girl poured out deep river in the

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Speaker 1: twilight and made me cry. Yeah. And so he was

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Speaker 1: really affected by this young woman and her voice, and

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Speaker 1: he cleared his schedule for her, and he was pretty

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Speaker 1: frank with her too. He told her, I will need

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Speaker 1: only two years with you. After that you will be

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Speaker 1: able to go anywhere and sing for anybody. And that

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Speaker 1: really proved to be true. But they started intensive training,

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Speaker 1: and she she did have a lot to learn. She

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Speaker 1: had a great natural gift, and she was really good

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Speaker 1: at what she had been singing, which was spirituals and gospel,

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Speaker 1: but she needed to hone her foreign language diction to

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Speaker 1: be able to sing art songs and sing arias from operas,

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Speaker 1: and to practice the style for that type of singing.

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Speaker 1: She made her more formally. Yeah, He trained her formally,

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Speaker 1: and so she practicing all of this all the while

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Speaker 1: with him, she toured black colleges and churches on the

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Speaker 1: East Coast, and in nine nineteen twenty four, she also

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Speaker 1: started making recordings with Joseph Pastor Nach, who was the

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Speaker 1: conductor of the Philharmonic Society of Philadelphia. And interestingly, these

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Speaker 1: were the first recordings African American concert artist recordings of

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Speaker 1: spirituals for a major label. And um Marian has so

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Speaker 1: many first that we're not going to be able to

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Speaker 1: acknowledge all of them. But I thought that was that

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Speaker 1: was an interesting recording milestone. But with all the success,

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Speaker 1: disappointment still had a surprisingly big effect on her. Yes,

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Speaker 1: probably the worst one came in April nineteen four when

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Speaker 1: she made her town Hall, New York City debut to

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Speaker 1: a nearly empty house. The reviews were really bad, and

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Speaker 1: after that she had to take time off to reconsider

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Speaker 1: her career before she finally decided to jump back in

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Speaker 1: for a smack collaboration with the Philharmonic Society of Philadelphia.

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Speaker 1: So she came back, but she was really down. There

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Speaker 1: ended up being a bump in the road, but she

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Speaker 1: she just had to think about whether this was something

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Speaker 1: she really wanted to pursue. But by she was confident

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Speaker 1: enough with her abilities and a strong enough singer that

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Speaker 1: but Getty secretly entered her name into this contest with

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Speaker 1: a very grand prize. Indeed, the winner would appear as

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Speaker 1: a soloist with the New York Philharmonic and as you

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Speaker 1: can imagine, it was competitive. There were three hundred singers

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Speaker 1: trying to get this prize, and by the time Anderson appeared,

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Speaker 1: the judges had already heard fifty singers that day. So

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Speaker 1: I guess imagine those early American idol tryouts. They're probably

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Speaker 1: pretty burnt out, except they were cutting people off with

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Speaker 1: a buzzer. Yes, they were cutting people off in the

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Speaker 1: middle of the buzzer. So she was seeing this before

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Speaker 1: she went up and performed, and was just dreading she

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Speaker 1: would go out there, pour her heart out, sing her

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Speaker 1: beautiful song and be cut off in the middle by

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Speaker 1: the buzzer. But they listened the whole way through. They

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Speaker 1: called her back, they had her sing a few different times,

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Speaker 1: and she ended up winning the competition and performed before

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Speaker 1: a crowd of seven thousand, five hundred people. So after

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Speaker 1: that town hall debacle, this was a real triumph and

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Speaker 1: really gave her the confidence to move on to the

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Speaker 1: next step in her career right, and that next step

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Speaker 1: was to head to Europe. There were fewer racial barriers.

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Speaker 1: There more of an opportunity to learn the languages of

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Speaker 1: classical music, including French, Italian, and German, as well as

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Speaker 1: European vocal style, so it just seemed to make sense

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Speaker 1: that this was this was the next logical step for her.

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Speaker 1: So in the fall of n she left for her

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Speaker 1: first trip, and she spent the next several years going

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Speaker 1: back and forth between there in the United States, and

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Speaker 1: at first she mostly studied in Germany. She studied language

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Speaker 1: addiction there and toward in Scandinavia, and the Scandinavians really

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Speaker 1: loved that her name was Anderson, just because yeah, the

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Speaker 1: newspapers there talked about quote maryon fever. So she was

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Speaker 1: really big there. But eventually she was touring the whole

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Speaker 1: continent and Asia as well. In four she made her

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Speaker 1: Paris debut, and in the Soviet Union she featured spirituals

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Speaker 1: and songs like ave Maria. She just changed the titles

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Speaker 1: to suit censors a little bit. They didn't want overtly

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Speaker 1: religious songs, but those were the songs. She wasn't willing

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Speaker 1: to not sing spirituals. That's what she had always done,

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Speaker 1: So just change things around a little bit. I made

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Speaker 1: a few adjustments. The government there actually liked her so

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Speaker 1: much they arranged for recordings to inspire Soviet young people

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Speaker 1: in the Soviet Union, which is is really bizarre if

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Speaker 1: you think about it, that this, uh, this young woman

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Speaker 1: from Philadelphia would be a model for Soviet youths. But

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Speaker 1: there you go. So during all this touring, though, she

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Speaker 1: also obviously came into contact with a lot of great

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Speaker 1: European composers and performers and directors, and she met Finnish

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Speaker 1: composer Jean Spilius for instance, and Arturo Toscanini perhaps gave

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Speaker 1: her one of her most famous compliments, which is, yours

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Speaker 1: is a voice such as one, here's only once in

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Speaker 1: a hundred years. And um, in some of the things

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Speaker 1: I read about Anderson, a lot of people said, we're

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Speaker 1: not anywhere close to that hundred years being up quite yet.

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Speaker 1: So it still holds true today, still holds true in

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Speaker 1: in some people's opinion. But by the mid nineteen thirties,

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Speaker 1: obviously Europe was getting to not be such a hospitable

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Speaker 1: place for Anderson anymore, so she started reconsidering where her

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Speaker 1: career was going to go, and at one point she

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Speaker 1: was even invited to sing in Berlin, where of course

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Speaker 1: she had performed extensively in the nineteen twenties, but organizers

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Speaker 1: called it off when they heard that she was not

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Speaker 1: quote one hundred percent arian surprise. Um, so she just

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Speaker 1: starts looking at at different options. It's time to move

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Speaker 1: on in her career yet again. So it was time

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Speaker 1: to come home for an extended stay. And fortunately her

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Speaker 1: success in Europe meant that she could bring on a

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Speaker 1: better manager because while her European tours had been a

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Speaker 1: grand success US, her state side manager, who was Arthur Judson,

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Speaker 1: had been pretty lackluster. He didn't book much for her,

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Speaker 1: and he even tried to convince her to be a

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Speaker 1: soprano and pursue the role of Aida, which was a

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Speaker 1: traditionally black song role. But at one point she got

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Speaker 1: so fed up with him that she booked it for

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Speaker 1: Sweden and actually stayed abroad there for two years. Ditched

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Speaker 1: or manager, and she was basically hiding from him. But

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Speaker 1: in Paris she had met impresario Soul Harrick and he

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Speaker 1: signed her away from Judson by guaranteeing at least fifteen

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Speaker 1: stateside concerts with a five hundred dollar fee per concerts.

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Speaker 1: So she was all about that. She was like, okay,

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Speaker 1: let's do it, and her homecoming concert was scheduled for

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Speaker 1: December thirtieth, ninety five at New York City's town Hall,

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Speaker 1: the site of her first major failure that we mentioned.

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Speaker 1: And to further complicate those bad memories that she must

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Speaker 1: have already had of the place, she also had just

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Speaker 1: broken her ankle, so she had this cast on her foot,

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Speaker 1: but she had to do the show anyway, leaning against

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Speaker 1: the piano, wearing a long, elegant dress to cover the cast,

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Speaker 1: standing on one foot. I mean, can you imagine how

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Speaker 1: much somebody like this too, when when you're gonna hear

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Speaker 1: her voice later in the podcast, somebody who clearly has

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Speaker 1: to put so much energy and power into her voice

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Speaker 1: standing on one foot, that would be pretty agonizing. But

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Speaker 1: this time her performance at the town Hall is a

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Speaker 1: huge success. The New York Times says there was no

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Speaker 1: doubt of it. She was mistress of all she surveyed,

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Speaker 1: so big success in New York. She's got this good

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Speaker 1: tour going on, making a lot of money. Actually, in

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Speaker 1: nineteen thirty eight, she made a quarter of a million dollars,

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Speaker 1: So just to give you an idea of how successful

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Speaker 1: she really was, it wasn't just good reviews. That's the

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Speaker 1: equivalent of three point seven million dollars today. So I

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Speaker 1: mean a quarter of a million sound. It still sounds

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Speaker 1: pretty I know. So she was. She was doing very

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Speaker 1: well for herself and as an artist. It seemed like

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Speaker 1: she was ready to perform in the nation's capital, to

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Speaker 1: perform in d C, and herrock wanted her to debut

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Speaker 1: at Constitution Hall, which was really the only venue that

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Speaker 1: could contain her many many fans. It was the biggest

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Speaker 1: venue in d C. But in the early nineteen thirties,

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Speaker 1: the d a R Daughters of the American Revolution, which

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Speaker 1: owned Constitution Hall, had instituted this policy against black performers.

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Speaker 1: They had originally allowed black performers, but they thought it

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Speaker 1: attracted too much of a black audience, so they made

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Speaker 1: a just blanket policy against black performers at Constitution Hall.

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Speaker 1: So Park tries to get them to maybe change their

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Speaker 1: roles for Anderson, and she is such a huge, celebrated star.

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Speaker 1: But even under pressure from him and from the n

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Speaker 1: double a CP and from Howard University, the d a

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Speaker 1: R refuses to back down from their policy. And unfortunately,

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Speaker 1: the next biggest venue in town, which was a local

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Speaker 1: white high school, was also out of the question because

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Speaker 1: the school board refused to allow Anderson to perform there.

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Speaker 1: So enter Eleanor Roosevelt. She was a member of the

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Speaker 1: d a R, probably its most prominent member. She resigned

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Speaker 1: publicly wrote the scathing letter to them, and started working

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Speaker 1: with her husband, who was the president at the time,

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Speaker 1: and others to book Anderson at the National Mall. So

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Speaker 1: if you, if you can't perform in the biggest concert venue,

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Speaker 1: perform at the most high profile place in the national

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Speaker 1: capital instead. And she did just that, and the Boy

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Speaker 1: Scouts handed out programs to a mixed race audience that

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Speaker 1: was there in attendance, and she was introduced by the

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Speaker 1: Secretary of the Interior, who introduced her by saying, quote,

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Speaker 1: in this great auditorium under the sky, all of us

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Speaker 1: are free. And after that introduction, she started her performance

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Speaker 1: with My country tis of thee. And here's what it

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Speaker 1: sounded like. That clip is pretty moving just listening to it,

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Speaker 1: but you can also see video footage of it, and

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Speaker 1: at the end she just breaks into this huge smile.

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Speaker 1: She's clearly aware of what an effect it had, and

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Speaker 1: looking back, it's clearly a moment of activism. It seems

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Speaker 1: like a preface to the civil rights movement that really

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Speaker 1: doesn't kick off for a few more years, but at

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Speaker 1: the time, Anderson herself didn't really identify as an activist.

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Speaker 1: She wasn't really interested in doing that or or being

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Speaker 1: that person. In fact, she had spent most of her

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Speaker 1: career avoiding racially charged situations altogether. She would take her

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Speaker 1: meals in hotel rooms to avoid uncomfortable situations at restaurants.

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Speaker 1: She'd sometimes have her white accompaniess fetch her food from

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Speaker 1: a restaurant that she wasn't able to go into. And

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Speaker 1: she'd even try to take cars instead of segregated trains

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Speaker 1: since it was such a hassle navigating all of the

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Speaker 1: social situations involved with that. And she would stay with

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Speaker 1: friends whenever she could. In Princeton, New Jersey, for example,

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Speaker 1: and nasaw In refused her room, so she ended up

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Speaker 1: staying with her pal Albert Einstein instead, which doesn't sound

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Speaker 1: so bad to me. And while she had refused to

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Speaker 1: sing in horizontally segregated venues, she accepted vertically segregated concerts,

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Speaker 1: So we were talking a little bit about that before.

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Speaker 1: Horizontally segregated means that there would be white people in

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Speaker 1: the orchestra section and then the black people would be

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Speaker 1: up in the kind of Nosebleed speaks about. Yeah, and

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Speaker 1: vertical segregation was everybody sort of had the opportunity to

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Speaker 1: have a good seat, but they were secret. So imagine

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Speaker 1: a line down the middle. So if whether you're black

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Speaker 1: or white, you could still buy a cheap seat, or

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Speaker 1: you could buy a really good seat up close. So

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Speaker 1: she made that distinction. She at least insisted on that.

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Speaker 1: She wanted people to be able to buy the seats

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Speaker 1: they wanted. So, yeah, she wasn't. She wasn't looking to

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Speaker 1: be this figure of activism. And she had even had

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Speaker 1: misgivings about performing the Lincoln Memorial Concert in the first place,

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Speaker 1: because by this point, because of the D A. R

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Speaker 1: controversy and Eleanor Roosevelt's involvement, it was really really high profile.

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Speaker 1: But part of her misgivings were just voice related. They

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Speaker 1: were just about the music. She had only performed once

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Speaker 1: before outside, so imagine your second concert outside in front

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Speaker 1: of seventy five thousand people and broadcast nationally. But she

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Speaker 1: did it anyway, and and she certainly didn't dwell on

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Speaker 1: the triumph once it was over either. In her autobiography,

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Speaker 1: she initially wished that the National Mall Concert, which is

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Speaker 1: probably the most identifiable part of her life was not

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Speaker 1: in the book her I think her co writer insisted

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Speaker 1: that it was. But to her the success she had

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Speaker 1: had in Europe, where she was celebrated just as a

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Speaker 1: great singer and not a public figure, not some sort

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Speaker 1: of civil rights figure, was more important to her. But

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Speaker 1: the concert also marked the real pinnacle of Anderson's career.

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Speaker 1: The Roosevelt's remained champions and fans of hers, and Anderson

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Speaker 1: became the first African American performer at the White House,

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Speaker 1: and later in nineteen thirty nine she performed there in

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Speaker 1: front of the King and Queen of England. And then

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Speaker 1: in nine she was invited by none other than the

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Speaker 1: d A. R. To perform a benefit concert. So they

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Speaker 1: came around it on faith. In a few years and

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Speaker 1: she she continued really high profile events too. She performed

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Speaker 1: at Eisenhower's second inauguration, she performed at John F. Kennedy's inauguration,

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Speaker 1: and in the nineteen fifties, even with a kind of

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Speaker 1: fading voice, by this point she had traveled extensively, she

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Speaker 1: had sunk so many concerts, and she was getting older,

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Speaker 1: she still made her Metropolitan Opera debut in Verdi's and

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Speaker 1: Bala on Mascara, and um, I am not familiar with

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Speaker 1: that opera, but supposedly, even though it's a small part,

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Speaker 1: it's a really really good part. It's vital to the story,

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Speaker 1: and it's got great music. And she had done Aria's

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Speaker 1: obviously all through her career, but she hadn't ever done

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Speaker 1: an opera before, so you know she was going to

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Speaker 1: have to act and where a costume and really really

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Speaker 1: sort of take on new roles in performing. And the

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00:23:51,400 --> 00:23:55,160
Speaker 1: part also extended into notes that were now uncomfortably high

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Speaker 1: for her. So she was reluctant to to get into

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Speaker 1: this in the first place, but finally she agreed because,

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Speaker 1: after all, I mean, who could resist a debut at

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Speaker 1: the Met in in there. I think she's in her

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00:24:06,600 --> 00:24:09,639
Speaker 1: fifties or sixties by this point, her fifties. Um, he

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00:24:09,840 --> 00:24:12,760
Speaker 1: was pretty nice. Rst have been a good lure too.

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Speaker 1: She was paid one thousand dollars per show, which at

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Speaker 1: that point was the highest fee paid to h MET

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Speaker 1: singer to date. Attendees to the show included Eleanor Roosevelt,

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Speaker 1: Margaret Truman, and the Duchess of Windsor, and she got

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Speaker 1: a five minute ovation at the end, so she probably

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Speaker 1: didn't have as much reason to worry as she thought.

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Speaker 1: When people just wanted to see her after the show

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Speaker 1: and she finally got to go back to her dressing room,

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Speaker 1: she had two thousand telegrams come in. I mean, can

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Speaker 1: you imagine what that would be like? Then? That was

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Speaker 1: actually even when some people were starting to call for

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Speaker 1: her to maybe consider retirement, she just had so many

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Speaker 1: people who still wanted to see her that she didn't

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Speaker 1: really consider it for a while. So she kept on touring,

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Speaker 1: even though she did slow her pace a little bit.

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Speaker 1: She eventually visited every continent except for Antarctica. She will

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Speaker 1: just give you a few highlights of these global tour.

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Speaker 1: She performed in front of the Imperial Court in Japan.

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Speaker 1: She was the first African American to do so. She

433
00:25:12,400 --> 00:25:16,080
Speaker 1: toured Israel because she really wanted to see places that

434
00:25:16,119 --> 00:25:19,920
Speaker 1: had inspired spirituals, like the River Jordans, the Walls of Jericho.

435
00:25:20,200 --> 00:25:24,080
Speaker 1: And an interesting detail about that, since German was not

436
00:25:24,480 --> 00:25:28,600
Speaker 1: um a very highly considered language in Israel at that time,

437
00:25:28,680 --> 00:25:32,080
Speaker 1: She performed a bronze piece which was originally written in

438
00:25:32,119 --> 00:25:36,880
Speaker 1: German translated into Hebrew, and I read a little Metropolitan

439
00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:39,840
Speaker 1: opera piece about that, and it noted that the audience

440
00:25:39,960 --> 00:25:42,960
Speaker 1: would not have cared if she had performed it in German,

441
00:25:43,119 --> 00:25:46,040
Speaker 1: but they were just thrilled that she did take the

442
00:25:46,160 --> 00:25:48,600
Speaker 1: extra step to to learn it in Hebrew and sing

443
00:25:48,600 --> 00:25:51,879
Speaker 1: it that way. After that, she traveled to Australia and

444
00:25:51,920 --> 00:25:54,840
Speaker 1: also to New Zealand and her sixties, and she didn't

445
00:25:54,880 --> 00:25:58,440
Speaker 1: integrated tour of Texas later too, and she also made recording,

446
00:25:58,560 --> 00:26:01,359
Speaker 1: so while she wasn't travel lng, she was putting her

447
00:26:01,440 --> 00:26:03,679
Speaker 1: voice on to tape. She did a hundred and fifty

448
00:26:03,680 --> 00:26:06,280
Speaker 1: tracks for R. C. A Victor, as well as a

449
00:26:06,359 --> 00:26:10,320
Speaker 1: documentary that was narrated by another great voice, Edward R. Murrow,

450
00:26:10,720 --> 00:26:13,920
Speaker 1: that was called The Lady from Philadelphia. And during all

451
00:26:13,960 --> 00:26:16,760
Speaker 1: of this work she settled down to she married an

452
00:26:16,760 --> 00:26:19,639
Speaker 1: old sweetheart. She had known him for I think since

453
00:26:19,680 --> 00:26:23,439
Speaker 1: her her twenties, Orpheus Fisher, and together they bought a

454
00:26:23,520 --> 00:26:27,119
Speaker 1: farm in Danbury, Connecticut, and they called it Marianna. So

455
00:26:27,200 --> 00:26:30,359
Speaker 1: she she was semi retired. I think that she was

456
00:26:30,400 --> 00:26:33,520
Speaker 1: still a pretty busy lady, though, yes she was. In

457
00:26:33,560 --> 00:26:36,439
Speaker 1: August nineteen sixty three, she returned to the side of

458
00:26:36,440 --> 00:26:39,600
Speaker 1: her previous triumph to sing He's got the whole world

459
00:26:39,600 --> 00:26:41,800
Speaker 1: in his hands, but her voice had gone to this

460
00:26:41,880 --> 00:26:44,760
Speaker 1: point so that she only got a light applause for this.

461
00:26:45,160 --> 00:26:48,360
Speaker 1: So that made her start to think really seriously at

462
00:26:48,359 --> 00:26:51,320
Speaker 1: this point about retirement, and she began a farewell tour.

463
00:26:51,800 --> 00:26:55,479
Speaker 1: That final tour started with a performance in October nineteen

464
00:26:55,560 --> 00:26:59,880
Speaker 1: sixty four Constitution Hall, and it included fifty cities overall,

465
00:27:00,000 --> 00:27:03,080
Speaker 1: in the last performance was at Carnegie Hall. She lived

466
00:27:03,080 --> 00:27:05,520
Speaker 1: in Connecticut until the last year of her life, when

467
00:27:05,560 --> 00:27:07,960
Speaker 1: she finally moved to Oregon to live with her nephew,

468
00:27:08,000 --> 00:27:11,199
Speaker 1: who was a conductor. And she died in nine at

469
00:27:11,200 --> 00:27:14,959
Speaker 1: age ninety four. Yeah, and there's some discrepancies about her age.

470
00:27:15,960 --> 00:27:19,040
Speaker 1: She I read in two different sources. One that she

471
00:27:19,080 --> 00:27:22,040
Speaker 1: adjusted her age so that she would be allowed to

472
00:27:22,119 --> 00:27:25,480
Speaker 1: sing as a child in a certain choir. She moved

473
00:27:25,480 --> 00:27:28,879
Speaker 1: it up a couple of years. Another thing I saw, though,

474
00:27:29,000 --> 00:27:32,520
Speaker 1: she was so disappointed that she had had to drop

475
00:27:32,520 --> 00:27:35,240
Speaker 1: out of high school temporarily and not graduate high school

476
00:27:35,280 --> 00:27:38,560
Speaker 1: until she was twenty four, that she's subtracted six years

477
00:27:38,720 --> 00:27:43,080
Speaker 1: from her birthday, making her younger than her two younger sisters.

478
00:27:43,600 --> 00:27:46,680
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's it's kind of I think she even

479
00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:50,600
Speaker 1: had seventy five and eightieth birthday celebrations that were definitely

480
00:27:50,640 --> 00:27:54,280
Speaker 1: not her seventy and eightieth birthdays. But there you go

481
00:27:54,560 --> 00:27:57,840
Speaker 1: just a little. Don't totally trust any age you c

482
00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:01,200
Speaker 1: associated with Mary Anderson. Good to know. Well, I guess

483
00:28:01,240 --> 00:28:03,200
Speaker 1: when you're that talented, you can get away with a lot.

484
00:28:03,280 --> 00:28:06,119
Speaker 1: So we have a few more fun random facts for

485
00:28:06,280 --> 00:28:09,880
Speaker 1: you about Marion Anderson. She is on the five thousand

486
00:28:09,880 --> 00:28:14,280
Speaker 1: dollar savings bond, which is pretty cool. I mean that's

487
00:28:14,320 --> 00:28:17,560
Speaker 1: almost like being on a bill, like a dollar bill.

488
00:28:17,960 --> 00:28:21,120
Speaker 1: That's a hefty savings bond. It's pretty heavily the best

489
00:28:21,119 --> 00:28:25,000
Speaker 1: people know about you. Yeah, and yeah, actually it's the

490
00:28:25,080 --> 00:28:27,800
Speaker 1: highest one right now because the ten thousand bond was

491
00:28:27,800 --> 00:28:31,960
Speaker 1: apparently discontinued according to the Treasury site. Um. She's also

492
00:28:32,160 --> 00:28:35,119
Speaker 1: on a US postage stamp, and I thought this was

493
00:28:35,280 --> 00:28:38,800
Speaker 1: really kind of poignant, But the d a R hosted

494
00:28:38,960 --> 00:28:43,680
Speaker 1: the dedication ceremony for the unveiling of her postage stamp.

495
00:28:43,720 --> 00:28:46,800
Speaker 1: They are really sorry about their treatment of Marion Anderson,

496
00:28:46,960 --> 00:28:50,360
Speaker 1: judging by their website, And if you want to learn

497
00:28:50,400 --> 00:28:54,240
Speaker 1: more about her, there's just so much out there, so

498
00:28:54,280 --> 00:28:58,080
Speaker 1: many pictures, so many recordings. It was really refreshing to

499
00:28:58,080 --> 00:29:01,560
Speaker 1: to research something like this after I don't know some

500
00:29:01,600 --> 00:29:06,200
Speaker 1: of the more medieval topics than doing. She's very well documented. Um,

501
00:29:06,200 --> 00:29:09,720
Speaker 1: there's a University of Pennsylvania collection with all sorts of

502
00:29:09,760 --> 00:29:12,640
Speaker 1: stuff on her, and a really great tribute in The

503
00:29:12,640 --> 00:29:16,040
Speaker 1: New Yorker by Alex Ross. And that's actually how I

504
00:29:16,080 --> 00:29:18,960
Speaker 1: first heard about her. UM. John Fuller, who hosts Stuff

505
00:29:18,960 --> 00:29:23,200
Speaker 1: from the B Side, suggested her after reading the Ross profile,

506
00:29:23,440 --> 00:29:27,280
Speaker 1: any recordings that you'd recommend, Um, I guess to start

507
00:29:27,360 --> 00:29:31,800
Speaker 1: with watching that whole Lincoln Memorial concert. That's that's what

508
00:29:31,880 --> 00:29:34,520
Speaker 1: I did. I think I didn't. I didn't listen to

509
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:37,480
Speaker 1: it at all until I was about halfway through with research,

510
00:29:37,520 --> 00:29:41,120
Speaker 1: and by that point it was it was so extra poignant,

511
00:29:41,280 --> 00:29:43,200
Speaker 1: I think. I mean, you and I were talking about

512
00:29:43,320 --> 00:29:46,320
Speaker 1: how when we were sort of going over this. Yeah,

513
00:29:46,360 --> 00:29:48,000
Speaker 1: I watched it right before we came in here, and

514
00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:55,360
Speaker 1: I got kind of tiary. Thank you so much for

515
00:29:55,440 --> 00:29:58,760
Speaker 1: joining us for this Saturday classic. Since this is out

516
00:29:58,760 --> 00:30:01,240
Speaker 1: of the archive, if you at an email address or

517
00:30:01,280 --> 00:30:03,920
Speaker 1: a Facebook, U r L or something similar during the

518
00:30:03,960 --> 00:30:06,680
Speaker 1: course of the show, that may be obsolete. Now. So

519
00:30:06,760 --> 00:30:10,640
Speaker 1: here's our current contact information. We are at history podcasts

520
00:30:10,680 --> 00:30:12,640
Speaker 1: at how stuff works dot com, and then we're at

521
00:30:12,760 --> 00:30:16,120
Speaker 1: missed in the history. All over social media that is

522
00:30:16,160 --> 00:30:20,680
Speaker 1: our name on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, and Instagram. Thanks

523
00:30:20,680 --> 00:30:25,000
Speaker 1: again for listening. For more on this and thousands of

524
00:30:25,000 --> 00:30:34,120
Speaker 1: other topics, is it how stuff works dot com