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'Vintage Black Glamour' Exposes Little-Known Cultural History

Credit Michael Ochs Archives / Getty Images

That's Bananas: "Whether [Josephine Baker's] getting a pedicure or she's walking down the street or she's relaxing in a yard somewhere, I just love the variety of pictures of her," Gainer says. "The banana skirt is a part of who she was, it's the most famous thing, but it just annoys me when that's just the only thing. ... There was a lot more to her than that."

Credit Robert Scurlock / The Smithsonian Institution

Actress Fredi Washington circa 1940s. Washington played Peola in the 1934 Academy Award-nominated Imitation of Life.

Credit The Schomburg Center

Langston Hughes, Charles S. Johnson, E. Franklin Frazier, Rudolph Fisher and Hubert Delany (brother of the Delany Sisters) overlooking St. Nicholas Avenue in Harlem in the 1920s.

Credit William Gottlieb / Library of Congress

Duke Ellington, amid "his 20 suits, 15 shirts, suede shoes and his ever present piano" in his dressing room at the Paramount Theater in New York in September 1946.

Credit Robert Scurlock / The Smithsonian Institution

Argentine dancer instructing a group of young women behind her in a dance at Howard University in February 1963.

Credit Scurlock Studios / The Smithsonian Institution

Camille Nickerson was noted for her research on the music and culture of Louisiana Creoles. She earned a B.A. and an M.A. from Oberlin College and also studied at Juilliard and Columbia University. Nickerson collected, arranged and published Creole folk songs and, during the 1930s to 1950s, lectured and performed as "The Louisiana Lady."

Credit William Lovelace / Getty Images

Lena Horne, the sultry American singer who appeared in several musicals in the '40s and was a regular of the Cotton Club, trying on a dress May 4, 1956.

By Tanya Ballard Brown

Originally published on Fri October 12, 2012 4:03 pm

I was scrolling through my Tumblr feed a year or so ago, when I saw a photo of Joyce Bryant. The caption said she was once dubbed the "black Marilyn Monroe" and was mentioned many times in Walter Winchell's gossip column.

8:36 am

Fri October 12, 2012

You Thought The VP Debate Was Feisty? Things Got Physical In California

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Democratic Reps. Howard L. Berman and Brad Sherman face off in a debate.

By Eyder Peralta

Originally published on Fri October 12, 2012 9:25 am

8:32 am

Fri October 12, 2012

Masur And Levine On Parkinson's, Animating Wild Things And Shattering A Stereotype

Credit Sean Gallup / Getty Images

Conductor Kurt Masur and his wife Tomoko in 2010.

By editor

Originally published on Wed October 17, 2012 3:53 pm

New York Philharmonic Music Director Emeritus Kurt Masur, 85, has announced that he has been living with Parkinson's disease for several years: "I have had the fortune of receiving great medical care since the diagnosis, enabling me to continue my conducting activities. These recent events have served as a good opportunity to make a return to the podium with a greater sense of purpose and awareness."

8:03 am

Fri October 12, 2012

NPR Bestsellers: Hardcover Fiction, Week Of October 11, 2012

Credit Knopf

By editor

In Jo Nesbo's Phantom, Harry Hole investigates Oslo's most virulent street drug. It debuts at No. 6.

The Salt

7:48 am

Fri October 12, 2012

The Secret To Genius? It Might Be More Chocolate

Credit John Loo / Flickr.com

A Swiss cardiologist plots a cheeky graph that shows a country's chocolate consumption may predict its chances of winning a Nobel.

By editor

Originally published on Fri October 12, 2012 4:13 pm

Listen

Nerds, rejoice! It's Nobel season — the Oscars for lab rats, peacemakers and cognoscenti alike. Every fall, big thinkers around the world wait for a middle-of-the-night phone call from Sweden, dreaming of what they might do with the $1.2 million prize.

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9:11 am

Fri October 12, 2012