Those We Lost — October 26

Honoring those we lost on October 26 — remembered for what they gave, and for what they left behind.

Hattie McDaniel

Born June 10, 1893 — died October 26, 1952

Actor, singer, songwriter, comedian, and radio performer

McDaniel became the first Black person to win an Academy Award, for Gone with the Wind, after building a career in vaudeville, radio, music, and film within sharply segregated industries. Her achievement broke an institutional barrier, while the stereotyped roles available to her remain essential to a full discussion of race, labor, and representation in Hollywood.

Elizabeth Ross Haynes

Born July 30, 1883 (some sources give July 31) — died October 26, 1953

Sociologist, YWCA leader, author, and political activist

Born in Lowndes County, Alabama, and educated at Fisk University and Columbia University, Haynes worked for the YWCA among Black women from 1908 and became the first African American woman appointed to the YWCA’s national board. Her 1923 Columbia master’s thesis was a major study of Black women workers. She published Unsung Heroes (1921) and The Black Boy of Atlanta (1952). Her research and organizing documented and supported Black working women. Her YWCA work helped bring about the board’s 1946 decision to integrate.

Louise Beavers

Born March 8, 1902 (some sources give 1900) — died October 26, 1962

Film and television actor and singer

Born in Cincinnati, Beavers began performing as a singer and moved into film in the 1920s. Her best-known role was Delilah Johnson in Imitation of Life (1934), a film that confronted racial passing. On early television she played the title housekeeper in Beulah (1952-53). Like many Black performers of her era, she was mostly limited to servant roles, and her career is central to discussions of race and representation in Hollywood. She was posthumously inducted into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame.

Mabel Hampton

Born May 2, 1902 — died October 26, 1989

Dancer, domestic worker, philanthropist, lesbian activist, and oral historian

Hampton performed during the Harlem Renaissance, supported Black and lesbian organizations, and preserved decades of community life through collecting, testimony, and work with the Lesbian Herstory Archives. Her archive and oral histories center a working-class Black lesbian life too often excluded from institutional records and connect Harlem culture to modern LGBTQ history.

Hamilton E. Holmes

Born July 8, 1941 — died October 26, 1995

Orthopedic surgeon, medical educator, and civil-rights pioneer

After a federal court ruled in January 1961 that he and Charlayne Hunter had been rejected because of race, Holmes became one of the first two Black students at the University of Georgia. He graduated in 1963 as a member of Phi Beta Kappa. That fall he became the first Black student admitted to Emory University School of Medicine, and he later became head of orthopedic surgery at Grady Memorial Hospital and an associate dean at Emory. His admission broke the color line at Georgia’s flagship university. UGA’s Holmes-Hunter Academic Building and lecture series carry his name.

Jack DeJohnette

Born August 9, 1942 — died October 26, 2025

Jazz drummer, pianist, composer, and bandleader

Chicago-born DeJohnette trained first as a classical pianist, then played drums with the Charles Lloyd Quartet in the 1960s and on Miles Davis’s Bitches Brew. He spent more than 25 years in a trio with Keith Jarrett and Gary Peacock and recorded widely as a leader, mostly for ECM. He won two Grammy Awards and was named a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master in 2012. His career of more than six decades shaped modern jazz drumming.

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Wear the history: Hattie McDaniel — from the Black Knowledge Wear collection.