The Life of Bessie Coleman by Connie Plantz

Author:Connie Plantz [Plantz, Connie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780766061194
Publisher: Enslow Publishers, Inc.
Published: 2014-03-11T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7

TAKING CHARGE

Citizens of Columbus, Ohio, looked forward to a spectacular exhibition on Labor Day in 1923. The air show would feature the feats of Bessie Coleman as well as stunt performers “Daredevil Erwin” and Iona McCarthy. Coleman received a letter from the mayor of the city, who wrote, “Being familiar with your career and the skill, daring and courage you have exhibited on so many occasions and knowing how your efforts have been recognized by the heads of many European governments, I deem it an honor and a privilege to welcome you to the city of Columbus.”1

The show was delayed because of rain. Coleman waited at Driving Park, hoping for clear skies. On the other side of the park, two thousand members of the Ku Klux Klan—in white robes and hoods—gathered for a picnic to welcome new members.2 The hate group targeted blacks, Catholics, and Jews, and its membership was growing.

The rain continued and the show had to be postponed. Coleman went back to Chicago. There, according to the Chicago Defender, she promised to perform, saying that she was expecting a plane to be delivered. She even announced that it would be exhibited at the 8th Regiment Armory.3 A plane never arrived, but she did return to Columbus to perform.

On September 9, 1923, ten thousand spectators cheered as Coleman circled, rolled, and dived in a borrowed plane. The crowd stomped and whistled as Daredevil Erwin hung from a plane by a leather strap clenched in his teeth. Next, Iona McCarthy performed an amazing stunt using three parachutes.4

Coleman’s exhibition was a success, but she still had no plane of her own, and no manager—and no more bookings. Because of her strong-willed, independent personality, she had fired or lost five managers.5

Coleman decided it was time to take a good long rest.6 She took her furniture out of storage and settled in an apartment at Forty-second and South Parkway in Chicago. There she visited with friends. She also cooked large meals for her nieces and nephew and let them play music on her windup Victrola record player. Sunday matinees at the Peerless Theater replaced her flying at the Airdrome.7

In the evenings Coleman attended jazz clubs such as the Dreamland. She wore elegant beaded gowns that she had bought in Paris and wigs curled in fashionable styles. On the arm of rich, influential escorts, she gracefully walked down the Stroll. Men of all nationalities came to the apartment to court her. “She was a pretty woman and she took advantage of it,” said her niece Marion.8

Prince Kojo Tovalou-Houénou became one of her companions.9 His father, the king of Dahomey (now Benin), Africa, had been forced out of his country by the French. Prince Kojo served as the head of Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA). This group believed that dark skin color was a sign of strength and beauty. The UNIA promoted racial pride and said that blacks should leave the United States because it was a white man’s country where a black person could not be successful.

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