Research Catalog
Mabel Mercer collection
- Title
- Mabel Mercer collection, 1941-1984.
- Author
- Mercer, Mabel, 1900-1984.
Available Online
Items in the Library & Off-site
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2 Items
Status | Container | Format | Access | Call Number | Item Location |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schomburg Center to submit a request in person. | Box 1 | Moving image | Use in library | Sc MG 536 Box 1 | Schomburg Center - Manuscripts & Archives |
Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schomburg Center to submit a request in person. | Box 2 | Moving image | Use in library | Sc MG 536 Box 2 | Schomburg Center - Manuscripts & Archives |
Details
- Description
- .33 lin. ft.
- Summary
- Collection consists of articles, interviews and profiles, publicity flyers, programs, and a scrapbook.
- Subjects
- Genre/Form
- Interviews.
- Scrapbooks.
- Note
- Photographs transferred to Photographs and Prints Division.
- Audiotapes transferred to Moving Image and Recorded Sound Division.
- Source (note)
- Lemert, Pearl
- Biography (note)
- Mabel Mercer (1900-1984) was a singer, song stylist, and night club entertainer. Born in England in 1900 to a Black musician father, Benjamin Mercer, and a white English vaudevillian mother, Emily Wadham Stonehouse, Mercer started her show business career at the age of fourteen. She joined a song and dance act with her mother and aunt in Europe. Later, in the 1920s, she appeared in Lew Leslie's "Blackbirds" in London, as part of a vocal trio. Around this time, Mercer started studying singing, with aspirations of becoming a concert singer. In the 1920s and 1930s, she was a successful night club singer in Paris, appearing at Ada "Bricktop" Smith's Bricktop's. She made her first appearance in the U.S. in 1938 and settled here in 1941, after marrying singer Kelsey Pharr, a member of the Delta Rhythm Boys. Mercer became an American citizen in 1952, where she was known as one of the most popular supper club singers for many years.
- Processing Action (note)
- Surveyed
- Accessioned
- Cataloging updated
- Call Number
- Sc MG 536
- OCLC
- NYPW89-A154
- Author
- Mercer, Mabel, 1900-1984.
- Title
- Mabel Mercer collection, 1941-1984.
- Biography
- Mabel Mercer (1900-1984) was a singer, song stylist, and night club entertainer. Born in England in 1900 to a Black musician father, Benjamin Mercer, and a white English vaudevillian mother, Emily Wadham Stonehouse, Mercer started her show business career at the age of fourteen. She joined a song and dance act with her mother and aunt in Europe. Later, in the 1920s, she appeared in Lew Leslie's "Blackbirds" in London, as part of a vocal trio. Around this time, Mercer started studying singing, with aspirations of becoming a concert singer. In the 1920s and 1930s, she was a successful night club singer in Paris, appearing at Ada "Bricktop" Smith's Bricktop's. She made her first appearance in the U.S. in 1938 and settled here in 1941, after marrying singer Kelsey Pharr, a member of the Delta Rhythm Boys. Mercer became an American citizen in 1952, where she was known as one of the most popular supper club singers for many years.
- Connect to:
- Research Call Number
- Sc MG 536