- Aliases
-
Will Handy
- Real name
- Robert Allen Cole
- Born
- July 1, 1868
- Died
- August 2, 1911
- Country
- United States
- IPI
-
00089301270 1 work
- Comments
-
Actor, composer, singer, playwright and stage director. He was the co-author of the first musical entirely created and owned by African Americans, "A Trip to Coontown". He was part of Black Patti's Troubadours, which was a vaudeville act featuring blackfaced singers and coon songs. When Cole's request for more money was rejected by the white managers of the company, he took his songs and left the outfit, only to have his reputation tainted by the managers claims that Cole was a thief and troublemaker. This resulted in Cole using the name "Will Handy" for his later publishing ventures.
At the turn of the century, Cole moved away from writing coon songs, establishing a fruitful partnership with J. Rosamond Johnson, frequently assisted by Johnson's brother, James Weldon Johnson, who, in 1897, became the first black since Reconstruction admitted to the Florida Bar. Johnson was also an early civil rights activist, pianist and gifted writer.
Following a nervous breakdown and severe depression, Cole committed suicide in 1911.
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