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Explore the people, places, events, achievements, struggles and stories that shaped our journey.
Movements, leaders, victories and the continuing fight for equality.
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Meet the people whose lives, choices and achievements shaped the journey.
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Moments that changed communities, movements, institutions and the nation.
Katherine Johnson’s mathematical calculations helped guide some of America’s most important early space missions while she confronted the racial and gender barriers faced by Black women in twentieth-century America.
MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
Willie Covan | |
|---|---|
| Born | March 4, 1898[1] |
| Died | May 7, 1989 (aged 91) |
| Occupations | Dancer, actor, choreographer |
| Years active | 1904 - 1978 |
| Spouse(s) | Anna Lee Hampton (m. 1918; 1923 or later)[2][1] Florence Byers (m. 1929; died 1978)[3][4] |
William McKinley Covan (March 4, 1898 – May 7, 1989) was an American tap dancer, actor, vaudeville performer best known for being a member of the tap quartet The Four Covans and a choreographer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Willie Covan was born on March 4, 1898, in Atlanta, Georgia. Shortly after, his family moved to Chicago. By 1903, Willie was already tapping to the rhythms of the city. When was six years old, he began a six-year career as a pickaninny in the numerous vaudeville shows around the city. There he watched dancers and began to pick up technique from miming them. By age 12, he was tired of pick tapping and started out to make a name for himself in the vaudeville circuit.[5]
Covan got his first big break winning an amateur tap contest around 1910. From that he was taken under the wings of legendary tap dancers "Slow Kid" Thompson, and Leonard Ruffin.[5] In 1927, he formed the tap quartet, The Four Covans.[6][7] They became an instant sensation in the United States and in Europe.[5]
In the early 1930s, Covan moved to Hollywood where he began working with screen stars such as Shirley Temple, Jeanette MacDonald, Mae West, Mickey Rooney, Gregory Peck, Kirk Douglas and Ann Miller. It was at Eleanor Powell's insistence that Covan had his own bungalow on the MGM lot.[8]
Among the handful of films in which he himself appeared, the one that best showcased Covan's talents is The Duke Is Tops.[9]
While at MGM, he opened his own dance studio in Los Angeles, The Willie Covan Dance Studio, where he and his wife Florence taught for 35 years. Later in life he was seen in films such as The Big Fix and Finian's Rainbow. Covan is most credited for creating many classic tap dance steps, including the Rhythm Waltz Clog, and Around the World. Covan died on May 7, 1989, in his home in Los Angeles and is interred at Inglewood Park Cemetery.[10]
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1929 | On with the Show! | Specialty Tap Dancers | Uncredited |
| Fox Movietone Follies of 1929 | Specialty Tap Dancers | Uncredited[11] | |
| 1938 | The Duke Is Tops | Specialty Tap Dancer | |
| 1940 | Gang War | Dance Specialty | Uncredited |
| 1968 | Finian's Rainbow | Sharecropper | Uncredited |
| 1978 | The Big Fix | Elderly Servant | (final film role) |
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.
The Duke Is Tops is a 1938 American musical film released by Million Dollar Productions and directed by William Nolte. The film was later released in 1944 under the title The Bronze Venus. It features top-billed Lena Horne in her film debut, along with Ralph Cooper. The film was one of the low-budget musical film "race movies" made in the 1930s and 1940s for the African-American market. The casts and production teams of these films were almost all black, and the music reflected current tastes in jazz and rhythm and blues.
Ralph Cooper (January 16, 1908 – August 4, 1992) was an American actor, screenwriter, dancer and choreographer. Cooper is best known as the original master of ceremonies and founder of amateur night at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, New York City, in 1935. He wrote, produced, directed and acted in ten motion pictures. Titles include The Duke Is Tops, Dark Manhattan, Gangsters on the Loose and Gang War. Because of his debonair good looks, he was known as "dark Gable" in the 1930s.
William McKinley Covan (March 4, 1898 – May 7, 1989) was an American tap dancer, actor, vaudeville performer best known for being a member of the tap quartet The Four Covans and a choreographer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Willie Covan was born on March 4, 1898, in Atlanta, Georgia. Shortly after, his family moved to Chicago. By 1903, Willie was already tapping to the rhythms of the city. When was six years old, he began a six-year career as a pickaninny in the numerous vaudeville shows around the city. There he watched dancers and began to pick up technique from miming them. By age 12, he was tired of pick tapping and started out to make a name for himself in the vaudeville circuit. Covan got his first big break winning an amateur tap contest around 1910. From that he was taken under the wings of legendary tap dancers "Slow Kid" Thompson, and Leonard Ruffin. In 1927, he formed the tap quartet, The Four Covans. They became an instant sensation in the United States and in Europe. In the early 1930s, Covan moved to Hollywood where he began working with screen stars such as Shirley Temple, Jeanette MacDonald, Mae West, Mickey Rooney, Gregory Peck, Kirk Douglas and Ann Miller. It was at Eleanor Powell's insistence that Covan had his own bungalow on the MGM lot. Among the handful of films in which he himself appeared, the one that best showcased Covan's talents is The Duke Is Tops. While at MGM, he opened his own dance studio in Los Angeles, The Willie Covan Dance Studio, where he and his wife Florence taught for 35 years. Later in life he was seen in films such as The Big Fix and Finian's Rainbow. Covan is most credited for creating many classic tap dance steps, including the Rhythm Waltz Clog, and Around the World. Covan died on May 7, 1989, in his home in Los Angeles and is interred at Inglewood Park Cemetery.
Neva Mary Peoples was a singer and dancer who appeared in several films in the United States. She performed as a singer, dancer, and chorus girl. Peoples was from San Francisco. A 1936 news clipping refers to her as the "colored blues singer and dancer from Frank Sebastian's Cotton Club in Hollywood." Her film debut was in the 1938 melodrama Gang Smashers singing "That's What You Get in Harlem". She played Ella in The Duke is Tops (1938). She was in a cabaret scene in the 1939 movie, One Dark Night. A 1942 photograph captured her and fellow performers in zoot suit costumes for the Republic Studio film, Hit Parade of 1943. She married Phil Moore in 1937 and had a son, George Phillip Moore III, in 1939. Moore's orchestra backed one of her performances.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →Shirley Chisholm, elected in 1968.
