(EDUCATION) Autograph book presented to Marian Anderson by A

Sale 2562 - Lot 213

Price Realized: $ 1,375

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 1,000 - $ 1,500

(EDUCATION.) Autograph book presented to Marian Anderson by Alpha Kappa Alpha members including founder Ethel Hedgeman Lyle. 48 manuscript pages. plus 4 clippings laid in on facing pages. Oblong 12mo, original boards, worn, decorative gilt front cover detached but present; minimal wear to contents. Philadelphia, 4 June 1938

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On 4 June 1938, the famed opera singer Marian Anderson was honored by a dinner in her home town of Philadelphia by leaders of Alpha Kappa Alpha, the nation's first Black sorority. This album was signed by 47 AKA members, many from the Philadelphia-based Omega Omega graduate chapter. Among them was Ethel Hedgeman Lyle, considered the founder and guiding light of Alpha Kappa Alpha, who urged Anderson to "go on, my dear, work and achieve, for the glory of our race." Facing her inscription is her printed portrait. The longest inscription is by Ida L. Byrd (also illustrated with a photograph), who wrote "Your grace and simplicity are for your whole people an unmatched diadem. Phyllis Wheatley, Harriett Tubman and Sojourner Truth hoped and prophesied for their race, but you, dear Marian, carry on; you achieve for your people!" Six days after this event, Anderson was granted an honorary Doctor of Music degree at Howard University, and then embarked on a concert tour of Latin America. Her famous Lincoln Memorial concert which cemented her international fame was less than a year later.

Alpha Kappa Alpha has been in the news lately, as their member Kamala Harris recently assumed the vice presidency of the United States--the first member of any sorority to reach such a high elected office (among her many other distinctions).