In honor of Black History Month, here is a 1921 letter we recently discovered from Yolande Du Bois to her father, American sociologist, historian, civil rights activist and author W. E. B. Du Bois, thanking him for sending her money to buy a ukulele.
“Thanks ever so much for the money for the Ukelele (sic). I went straight down-town the next Saturday and bought it. It is a ‘banjo Ukelele,’ and it’s very pretty. It is made of light-colored maple highly polished and trimmed in black. I can play two pieces on it.”
She goes on on to tell her father that she made the dean’s list at Fisk.
Yolande Du Bois was involved in the Harlem Renaissance, and later had a career as an educator in Baltimore.
And to her father Dr. Du Bois' many accolades, we humbly add "ukulele patron."
Du Bois, Yolande. Letter from Yolande Du Bois to W. E. B. Du Bois, March 16, 1921. W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries.
All rights for this document are held by the David Graham Du Bois Trust.
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