Herb Jeffries

Born Herbert Jeffrey in Detroit, Michigan, Herb's name came about when a printer misspelled his name for the recording "Blue Because of You" with Earl "Fatha" Hines.

 Described as light skin with dark wavy hair and a sporty mustache.  Sometimes mistaken for Latino. Herb had a baritone voice.  Raconteur (storyteller or a person who tells anecdotes in a skillful and amusing way.) with confidence, jaunty savoir faire (the ability to act or speak appropriately in social situations.).

Actress Ruby Dee found him to be very handsome.

According to Jeffries, Whites used the word Harlem to identify with Blacks (then Negroes) in such films as

'Harlem Rides The Range' (1939).

Ralph Cooper

Ralph Cooper was one of the founder's of Lincoln Motion Picture Company.

 Mae West, Joan Crawford, Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley watched the Harlem Apollo Amateur Night when visiting New York.

Ralph Cooper was an American actor, dancer and the originator and master of ceremonies of Amateur Night at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, New York.

Cooper was sometimes referred to as 'The Dark Gable'

Ralph was described as tall, broad shouldered, light skinned with almost jet black hair. 

Ralph Cooper was an actor, dancer, comic.  Twentieth Century Fox hired him in the mid 1930's to choreograph the Shirley Temple movie 'Poor Little Rich Girl'.

While at Fox, he went to their training school to learn as much as he could about working behind the scenes.  Directing, script writing, lighting, set designing-------everything you needed to know about film-making.

 With Lena Horne in "The Duke Is Tops" (1938) later dubbed "Bronze Venus".

Rita Hayworth