Richard B. Harrison

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Richard Berry Harrison (September 28, 1864 - March 14, 1935) was a renowned actor, teacher, dramatic reader and lecturer. He was featured on the cover of TIME magazine on March 4, 1935. The son of fugitive slaves, Harrison was born in London, Ontario, Canada, on September 28, 1864, the eldest of five siblings.

Harrison became extremely well-known after playing "de Lawd" in more than 1,650 performances of Marc Connelly’s play, The Green Pastures, which opened on Broadway on February 26, 1930. The show ran for 16 months, then went on tour appearing in more than 203 cities and towns (including his hometown of London, Ontario, at the Grand Theatre) and later won a Pulitzer Prize for Drama for playwright Connelly in 1931.

He taught elocution and dramatics courses at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College, Branch Normal in Arkansas, and Flipper-Key College in Oklahoma.

Harrison died of heart failure in New York City, on March 14, 1935, 10 days after he was featured on the cover of TIME magazine.

[edit] Accolades

Received the NAACP’s 1930 Spingarn Medal for Distinguished Achievement
On his 70th birthday in 1934, he was awarded an honorary Masters of Arts degree from Howard University and honorary doctorate degrees in Dramatic Literature from North Carolina Agriculture and Technical College and Lincoln University, and he became the first actor ever to be awarded the Sigma Society Key from Boston University. He had shaken the hands of mayors and received congratulatory telegrams from 14 university presidents and seven governors, was praised by many religious leaders for his performance and was awarded an inscribed Bible from the Clergy Club of New York City
A public library in Raleigh, North Carolina, was named after Harrison in 1935. In today's Richard B. Harrison Library is also the Richard B. Harrison community auditorium
Richard B. Harrison High School is named after Harrison at Elm And Mc Haney Streets in Blytheville, Arkansas
Richard B. Harrison Gymnasium on Noble Street in Smithfield-Selma, North Carolina, is named after Harrison
Harrison has also received honorary degrees from many U.S. colleges and univerities.
Due largely to the efforts of documentary filmmaker/ historian Chris Doty, in 2003 an interpretive historical plaque was erected in a London, Ontario, park named in Harrison's honour at the foot of Clarence Street, near where Harrison’s childhood home was before it was torched in a race-related incident, hours after the Harrison family moved to Detroit, Michigan, circa 1880. (Harrison's childhood home was located on Wellington Street (west side) immediately north of the Thames River.)
In 2006, the Richard B. Harrison Auditorium was completed at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG).

[edit] References

De Lawd: Richard B. Harrison and the Green Pastures by Walter C. Daniel, Series: Contributions in Afro-American and African Studies, Hardback, 188 pages, 1986, Greenwood Press, ISBN 0-313-25300-5