"The Unwritten History": Alexander Gumby's African America

Scrapbook 92:
"The Negro in Drama, pt. 2," p. [6]

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Scrapbook 92:
"The Negro in Drama, pt. 2,"
p. [7]

Click here for item information

Records of specific productions of plays (including programs, reviews, and the like) appear throughout Gumby's collection, representing both Gumby's interest in the theater and his penchant for memorializing the talked-about events of his day. Given the artistic circles in which Gumby immersed himself, the production of In Abraham's Bosom that is noted in the above pages was no doubt an unavoidable addition to his collection. Debuting in late 1926 at the Provincetown Playhouse in Greenwich Village--which had a reputation for producing new and controversial work--Paul Green's play about the struggles of a North Carolina man who had a white father and a black mother in the late nineteenth century offered both a poignant commentary on Jim Crow and a relatively rare opportunity for African-American actors such as Julius Bledsoe and Rose McClendon to share the stage with white actors in a serious dramatic production. Opening to wide acclaim, the play's legendary status was secured when it won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1927.