• Celebrity
    • Of The Essence
    • Celebrity News
    • If Not For My Girls
    • The State Of R&B
    • Time Of Essence
  • Fashion
    • 2023 Best In Black Fashion Awards
    • 2023 Fashion House
    • Red Carpet
    • Fashion News
    • Accessories
  • Beauty
    • Girls United: Beautiful Possibilities
    • 2023 Best In Black Beauty
    • Skin
    • Makeup
    • Nails
    • Hair
  • Lifestyle
    • Love
    • Parenting
    • Relationships
    • Bridal Bliss
    • Lifestyle News
    • Health & Wellness
    • ESSENCE Eats
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
  • Entrepreneurship
    • Money & Career
  • News
    • Latest News
    • Paint The Polls Black
    • Culture
    • Politics
  • Shopping
  • Video
  • Events
    • 2023 Fashion House
    • 2023 ESSENCE Festival Of Culture
    • 2023 Wellness House
    • 2023 Black Women In Hollywood
    • 2023 ESSENCE Film Festival
    • 2023 HOLLYWOOD HOUSE
  • Studios
  • Girls United

WHERE BLACK CULTURE, COMMUNITY AND CONSCIOUSNESS MEET

Sign up for ESSENCE Newsletters the keep the Black women at the forefront of conversation.

Your email is required.
Your email is in invalid format.
Confirm email is required.
Email did not match.
Select the newsletters you'd like to receive:
Please select at least one option.
By clicking Subscribe Now, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Skip to content
SUBSCRIBE
  • MAGAZINE
  • NEWSLETTER
  • Celebrity
    • Of The Essence
    • Celebrity News
    • If Not For My Girls
    • The State Of R&B
    • Time Of Essence
  • Fashion
    • 2023 Best In Black Fashion Awards
    • 2023 Fashion House
    • Red Carpet
    • Fashion News
    • Accessories
  • Beauty
    • Girls United: Beautiful Possibilities
    • 2023 Best In Black Beauty
    • Skin
    • Makeup
    • Nails
    • Hair
      • Hair News
      • Natural
      • Relaxed
      • Transitioning
      • Weave
      • 4C
  • Lifestyle
    • Love
    • Parenting
    • Relationships
    • Bridal Bliss
    • Lifestyle News
    • Health & Wellness
    • ESSENCE Eats
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
  • Entrepreneurship
    • Money & Career
  • News
    • Latest News
    • Paint The Polls Black
    • Culture
    • Politics
  • Shopping
  • Video
  • Events
    • 2023 Fashion House
    • 2023 ESSENCE Festival Of Culture
    • 2023 Wellness House
    • 2023 Black Women In Hollywood
    • 2023 ESSENCE Film Festival
    • 2023 HOLLYWOOD HOUSE
  • Studios
  • Girls United
Home · News

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
By · Updated October 29, 2020
01
A Star is Born

Lena Mary Calhoun Horne was born in Brooklyn, New York, on June 30, 1917.

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
02
Lena Horne

In the 1940s, she was one of the first Black performers hired to sing with a major White band.

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
03
Lena Horne

The gifted jazz legend starred in the all-Black film “Cabin in the Sky,” in 1943.

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
04
Lena Horne

“I was always battling the system to try to get to be with my people. Finally, I wouldn’t work for places that kept us out … it was a damn fight everywhere I was, every place I worked, in New York, in Hollywood, all over the world,” she said in Brian Lanker’s book “I Dream a World: Portraits of Black Women Who Changed America.”

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
05
Lena Horne

Horne dropped out of school at age 16 to support her sickly mother and joined the chorus line at the popular Cotton Club in
Harlem, New York.

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
06
Lena Horne

In 1942, she headlined a show at the Little Troc nightclub with the Katherine Dunham dancers and later received a movie offer from MGM.

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
07
Lena Horne

She is mostly associated with the song “Stormy Weather,” where she is also known to be performing in the 1943 film “Stormy Weather.”

She won a Tony Award for her 1981 one-woman Broadway show, “Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music.”

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
08
Lena Horne

“I don’t have to be an imitation of a white woman that Hollywood sort of hoped I’d become,” Horne once said. “I’m me, and I’m like nobody else.”

She was very involved in many social and political organizations.

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
09
Lena Horne

She was married to Louis J. Jones, the pair had a daughter Gail and a son, Teddy. The marriage later ended in divorce in 1944.

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
10
Lena Horne

Lena Horne died on Sunday (May 9) at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, she was 92.

ESSENCE mourns the loss of Lena Horne. With tremendous talent, striking beauty and grace, she persevered through the difficult circumstances of racial intolerance. She not only delighted us with her talent, but inspired us with her personal calling as an advocate for civil rights. Lena Horne is an American treasure and she lived life to the fullest with passion, purpose and responsibility.

—ESSENCE Editor-in-Chief Angela Burt-Murray

Rest in Peace: Lena Horne
COMPANY INFORMATION
  • Our Company
  • Customer Service
  • Essence Ventures
  • Change Your Address
  • Contact Us
  • Job Opportunities
  • Internships
  • Media Kit
  • tag
SUBSCRIBE
  • Newsletters
  • Give a Gift of ESSENCE
  • Magazine Tablet Edition
FOLLOW US
MORE ON ESSENCE
  • Home
  • Love
  • Celebrity
  • Beauty
  • Hair
  • Fashion
  • ESSENCE festival

ESSENCE.com is part of ESSENCE Communications, Inc.

Essence may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.

©2023 ESSENCE Communications Inc. All Rights Reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use | Essence.com Advertising Terms

Get The ESSENCE Newsletter and
Special Offers delivered to your inbox

By clicking Sign Up, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

Get The ESSENCE Magazine
by subscribing below
subscribe now