Much like sports, in the entertainment arena, where would America be without the inventive excellence of Black people? Without our input and outsized influence, things may be mighty mediocre.
Born in 1880 on St. Valentines day, New York native Ada Overton (gaining sophistication as a performer, Walker changed her name to Aida, after the Nubian princess in Verdi’s acclaimed opera) started her theatrical career early. At just 15, she joined John Isham’s Black touring company, the “Octoroons.” That gig didn’t last long. In short order, she left to join the chorus of “Black Patti’s Troubadours,” the “chitlin circuit” vehicle of soprano Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones. It was a wise decision to become affiliated with the established African American operatic star. Jones was renowned around the world. Due to white supremacy’s bias, she was famous as “The Black Patti,” referencing the Italian prima-Dona. However, so far as the quality of their voices was concerned, Patti might just as easily have been characterized as “the white Jones.” It was in Jones’ troupe that Overton met comic vaudevillian George Walker, her future husband. They wed in 1899. While she was just 19, he was 26. For the entirety of her life, despite changes of affiliation, she would forever be associated with her handsome, smooth-talking husband and his more demure partner, Bert Williams.
Bert Williams and George Walker, who, as Williams and Walker, changed history on the American stage. (Public domain photo) 
Designed by Cleverdon & Putzel, Aida Overton Walker’s house at 107 West 132nd Street was completed in 1886. It has not been repaired since a fire almost three years ago. (Michael Henry Adams photo) 
Daniel K. Atkinson’s book is the first biography of Walker’s husband, George Walker. (Public domain photo) 
As early as 1903, the Walkers anticipated the Castle dance team to come. (Public domain photo)
As Williams and Walker, these Black men transformed entertainment on Broadway. Their creativity made theater in the U.S. decidedly more American. Both were determined to co-opt minstrelsy’s indignity and defamation, transforming stereotypical ridicule into defiant empowerment. Much as the Waynans would do with “In Living Color,” employing self-deprecating humor, they caricatured racism’s absurdity. They turned the tables. Calling themselves “Two Real Coons,” they even wore blackface. If whites could blacken up to enrich themselves, satirizing Black life, with Bert’s slow-witted simpleton, always led astray by George’s big-talking con man, they could too. Only, in the process, with cunning irony and heartfelt pathos, they aimed to make integrated audiences laugh uproariously, all the while redeeming Black humanity.
Authenticity and aspirational dreaming of self-improvement, anyone could empathize with, were secret weapons they wielded expertly. The sometimes intolerant talented tenth might have clutched their pearls, fearing for hard-won respectability, in indignation. But plain folks? They loved Williams and Walker; they admired their wives, the catchy, toe-tapping tunes they used, composed by serious musicians like Bob Cole or Will H. Dixon. They adored their shows, the new but familiar dance steps, their hilarity, and their style. With all their hearts, Black Americans relished the fun of Williams and Walker, and in surprising numbers, much of white America did too.
In 1900, Walker first gained national attention performing “Miss Hannah from Savannah” from Sons of Ham. For the next decade, she would follow success with success.
Even before 1911, when her husband succumbed to syphilis, she’d already begun to play his part in roles he could no longer remember. Dressed in drag as a man, singing “Bon Bon Buddy,” she gained her greatest acclaim, in the process, it was reported, “holding her audiences spellbound.” Many newspapers printed cartoons of Walker outfitted in male attire. Familiar to hundreds of thousands in print and across the footlights, in so many ways with her act and larger-than-life persona, she helped to accustom ordinary people to new ways of being.
Walker was unapologetic about ambition or aspirations of fame. She accomplished her goal by refining the Black folk dance called the “cakewalk,” a commentary on effete affectations characteristic of white folks’ idea of stylishness. Replacing rambunctious gyrations with more graceful movements, she thoroughly transformed an undisciplined romp into an elegant promenade suitable for a ballroom dance floor. Her metamorphosis of the cakewalk reflected the same impulse that inspired her to conquer ‘serious’ dance, creating her own interpretation performing the provocative dance of seven veils from Oscar Wilde’s play “Salomé.”
Walker was equally brilliant when exploiting contacts with prominent whites that could enhance her career. When New York’s and Newport’s leading gay millionaire host, Robert “Bobbie” Hargous, held a dinner dance, as “In Dahomey” was a runaway hit, he decided on a more memorable form of entertainment than yet another cotillion. In a way, he was late to the game of introducing Negro artists as a party novelty, sure to dispel the “old ennui” endemic among the very rich. That previous August, Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt II, as part of her successful bid to lead Gilded Age social life, had dazzled Newport by engaging the cast and crew of Broadway’s hit musical, “The Wild Rose.” For but one night, the Knickerbocker Theater was shut down, and a new temporary auditorium, that could be changed into a ballroom, was built on the lawn at “Beaulieu.” The play was condensed to occupy the hour and a half interval before supper was served, preceding dancing. In addition, along a brilliantly lighted fairground-style midway, extending dreamily towards the sea, every conceivable carnival attraction was available. Including Eddie Foy, Walker, and members of her troupe were also on hand, offering lessons in the intricacies of the cakewalk.
Hargous plans ran along similar lines. New York’s most elegant whites had not only treated Blacks with courtesy, graciously offering them refreshments, but finally, arms entwined, they proceeded to dance. Compared to Booker T. Washington dining with Teddy Roosevelt, how sexually charged this must have seemed. Irrespective of color or class, readers were thoroughly shocked. Some were even outraged.
Walker’s further impudence, referring to Mrs. Arthur Paget, “As my friend Mrs. Paget, [the dinner’s American-born guest of honor, married to an English aristocrat, she was about to return to]” made some openly pity the “Naive Negress.” Her evident lack of sufficient awareness to appreciate the capricious whims of a great lady of fashion was, they felt, laughable. No matter what she might say otherwise, condescending to address someone of such lowly station, it could hardly be expected that Mrs. Paget was actually going to honor a promise made in the midst of an exuberant evening out’s fun.
But with Walker’s triumph touring, the laugh was on the doubters. Seemingly at the wave of Mrs. Paget’s gloved hand, all doors were open to her. Demand for lessons in dancing the cakewalk flooded in. Then cakewalk’s queen was “commanded” to dance before King Edward VII, and Alexandra, his Queen, on a specially constructed stage in the garden of Buckingham Palace.
But this coup was not all. A future Sovereign, little Prince Edward, called David, the presumptive heir, shook hands with the Black lady entertaining at his ninth birthday celebration. “It was a very nice dance,” he murmured. This was a moment to cherish, a charming gesture only exceeded by the diamond brooch the King had bestowed on Walker by way of thank you.
A feature of Walker’s appeal among Blacks was her lavish lifestyle. She lived in a handsome Queen Anne-style house in Harlem at 107 West 132nd Street. Her private carriage, though elegant, was unostentatious. Like Madame Walker and her daughter or hat-maker Madame Seay, she was that rare role model, reminding masses of Black women of the efficacy of dreams and prayer. For those so often defeated by life, she offered hope, however elusive; there was an alternative to giving way to despair. Wearing Paris fashions and real jewels, including a diamond peacock feather brooch, a diamond necklace, a tiara, and earrings, she defied being limited by an unjust society. If whites eschewed hoop earrings, due to an association with enslaved Blacks, adding diamonds, Walker wore hers proudly.
Who could know she would die herself, so soon after her husband? Many critics contended that Walker was only just approaching the zenith of a career that ought to have lasted a long lifetime. Towards the end, how galling it must have been for Walker to witness the plaudits offered to the white husband and wife dance team, Vernon and Irene Castle, who so thoroughly appropriated the popular ragtime dance craze she originated?
Lying in state in 1914, at the new St. Philip’s Episcopal Church, thousands passed Walker’s bier. In a very short time, she accomplished a great deal. Widely mourned, she was only 34.
It’s about time to revive the stature of our once colossal star. Sure signs point to the time being ripe. Daniel E. Atkinson, an independent scholar who earned his doctorate in ethnomusicology from the University of Washington, has just published the first biography of her husband, “The Rediscovery of George ‘Nash’ Walker: The Price of Black Stardom in Jim Crow America.” ‘But, what,’ you might ask, ‘can we do that helps to reverse Aida Overton Walker’s unceremonious erasure?’ Ought we not at least pledge our commitment to restoring her Harlem home?
Madam Maude Seay, Will H. Dixon and their daughter Miss Frankye A. Dixon (classical pianist and music educator) qualifies as ‘Lesser-known Luminaries of Harlem’ series with a spotlight on their cultural contributions. Thank you to Michael Henry Adams for highlighting the names of Will H. Dixon and Madame Seay in his Aida Overton Walker article.