#billie holiday – @kittennightfarts on Tumblr

Poet and award-winning author, Maya Angelou.
Former Black Panther and activist, Angela Davis.
Harlem Renaissance poet and literary figure, Langston Hughes.
First Black woman to be nominated for an Academy Award for best actress, Dorothy Dandridge.
Superstar singer and dancer, Josephine Baker.
The man who helped break the color barrier in Major League Baseball, Jackie Robinson.
‘The fastest woman in the world,’ Wilma Rudolph.
Historian, sociologist and co-founder of the @NAACP, W.E.B DuBois.
“The first Black woman millionaire in America,” Madam CJ Walker.
Anti-lynching crusader and journalist, Ida B. Wells.
The first black model to appear on the cover of Vogue, Donyale Luna.
One of the most prolific and influential jazz singers of all-time, Billie Holiday.
The civil rights activist who helped ignite the Montgomery bus boycott, Rosa Parks.
Singer-songwriter who became known as the “Queen of Disco” in the ‘70s, Donna Summer.
Civil rights leader and minister Martin Luther King, Jr.

This is an amazing way to celebrate black excellence during Black History Month. Each one of the represented historical figures made a huge contribution to our future. Remembering these people, who changed the history and changed the world and honoring them in such a beautiful way is just miraculous. Never forget their bravery, their will to have equality for everyone in this country.

#ProudAlumni ✊🏾🔥

80prooftruth

Ayyyyyyye!

kittennightfarts reblogged

spearwife-rachel

galedekariosfanaccount

You like potaytoes and I like potahtoes You like tomaytoes and I like tomahtoes potaytoes, potahtoes, tomaytoes, tomahtoes Let’s call the whole thing off But oh, if we call the whole thing off Then we must part And oh, if we ever part Then that might break my heart

#billie holiday #let's call the whole thing off #music #classic

kittennightfarts reblogged

gilgamunch

lesbianavagardner

Billie Holiday was performing in a Manhattan club in 1943, and between sets she took a seat at a table and ordered her usual Top and Bottom (a mixture of gin and port wine). Two white sailors from the South, on leave in the Big Apple, approached her, wanting to know where a “darkie” got off wearing a mink coat. When Lady told them to get lost they snuffed out their cigarettes in her mink. Without pause, Holiday told them to meet her outside, if they had any balls. At which point Holiday proceeded to beat them both unconscious with her fists. It was a bad idea to mess with Lady Day.

Rich English on the toughness of Billie Holiday (via sinatrra)

#billie holiday #bamf #hbic #lady day #rich english

kittennightfarts reblogged

pricklylegs

oldhollywood:

“I’ve been told that nobody sings the word ‘hunger’ like I do. Or the word ‘love.’ Maybe I remember what those words are all about. Maybe I’m proud enough to want to remember Baltimore and Welfare Island, the Catholic institution and the Jefferson Market Court, the sheriff in front of our place in Harlem and the towns from coast to coast where I got my lumps and scars, Philly and Alderson, Hollywood and San Francisco, every damn bit of it.”

“All the Cadillacs and minks in the world - and I’ve had a few - can’t make it up or make me forget it. All I’ve learned in all those places from all those people is wrapped up in those two words. You’ve got to have something to eat and a little love in your life before you can hold still for any damn body’s sermon on how to behave. Everything I am and everything I want out of life goes smack back to that.”

— Billie Holiday, quoted in Lady Sings the Blues (1956)

#billie holiday #lady sings the blues #struggle #music #pain #history

kittennightfarts reblogged

pricklylegs

Jazz Legends Part 2 by Garth Glazier

Check out Part 1

Artist: Tumblr / Behance

#jazz #music #art #louis armstrong #billie holiday #wynton marsalis #ornette coleman #illustration #garth glazier