Dorothy Dandridge

American actress and popular singer, the first African American to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress.

Under the prodding of her mother, Dorothy and her sister began performing publicly as “The Wonder Children”, usually in black Baptist churches throughout the country. As the depression worsened, Dandridge and her family moved to Los Angeles where they had hopes of finding better work, perhaps in film. Her first film was a bit part in a 1935 Our Gang short, with another minor role in the Marx Brothers comedy, A Day at the Races (1937).

It was another three years before she was next on screen, as a murderer in Four Shall Die (1940). In all of her early films Dandridge played stereotypical African-American roles, but her singing ability and presence brought her huge popularity in the nation’s finest hotel nightclubs around the country.

In 1954, she appeared in the title role in the all-black production of Carmen Jones. This won her an Academy Award nomination but she lost out to Grace Kelly in The Country Girl.

Dandridge was to make seven more films, two of which - Island in the Sun (1957) and Porgy and Bess (1959) - were exceptional. Her last was The Murder Men (1961).

Dandridge faded quickly after that with a poor second marriage, bad investments, other financial woes, and a problem with alcohol. She was found dead in her West Hollywood apartment on September 8, 1965, the victim of an overdose of an accidental overdose of a prescription anti-depressant. She was only 42.

This is a lovely vintage postcard (a little smaller than 6" x 4"), nicely signed across the image in black fountain pen ink. In very good condition. RARE.