Celebrations Today – April 7

Holidays and observances

Christian feast days:
Flag Day (Slovenia)
Genocide Memorial Day (Rwanda), and its related observance:
- International Day of Reflection on the 1994 Rwanda Genocide (United Nations)
Motherhood and Beauty Day (Armenia)
National Beer Day (United States)
Sheikh Abeid Amani Karume Day (Tanzania)
Women’s Day (Mozambique)
World Health Day (International observance)

Celebrations Today – USA: April 7

National Beer Day
National Coffee Cake Day
National No Housework Day
National Education and Sharing Day – Changes Annually – 11th day of the month of Nisan on the Jewish calendar
National Army Day
National Church of Latter Day Saints Day
National Drowsy Drivers Awareness Day
National Fresh Tomato Day
International Day of Sport for Development and Peace
National Jump Over Things Day
National Hostess Twinkie Day
National Siamese Cat Day
National Student Athlete Day
National New Beers Eve

Today in US History: April 7

Billie Holiday

Mama may have, Papa may have,
But God bless the child that’s got his own.Billie Holiday and Arthur Herzog, Jr., “God Bless the Child”

[Portrait of Billie Holiday, Downbeat, New York, N.Y., ca. Feb. 1947],
William P. Gottlieb, photographer.
William P. Gottlieb: Photographs from the Golden Age of Jazz

Jazz singer Billie Holiday was born on April 7, 1915, in Baltimore, Maryland. She made her professional singing debut in Harlem nightclubs in 1931, and her first recordings in 1933. Although she had no formal musical training, she became one of the greatest jazz singers of all time; her recordings are now regarded as masterpieces.

Holiday’s autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues,¹ opens with the line: “Mom and Pop were just a couple of kids when they got married; he was 18, she was 16 and I was three.” Holiday’s given name was Eleanora Fagan, but when she started to perform she chose the stage name Billie after Billie Dove, a star in silent, and later sound, movies.

A Terrible Blot on American Civilization.
3424 Lynchings in 33 Years [detail], 1922.
An American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Other Printed Ephemera

The tension of racism was a powerful subtext to Holiday’s life story. Because of Jim Crow laws, still in effect through most of her career, she occasionally found herself in the ironic situation of being the featured vocalist in clubs that refused to serve blacks. The liner notes to Immortal Sessions of Billie Holiday describe her 1939 rendition of Lewis Allan’s “Strange Fruit,” a composition about lynching, is “…the most anguished and harrowing expression of protest against man’s inhumanity to man that has ever been made in the form of vocal jazz.” ²

Nicknamed “Lady Day” by musician Lester Young, Holiday often wore white gardenias fastened in her hair when performing. She worked with many jazz greats including Count Basie, Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw and, in the film New Orleans, with Louis Armstrong and Kid Orey. She appeared at both small clubs and prestigious venues such as Town Hall, Carnegie Hall and the Apollo Theater.

View of the Apollo Theatre Marquee, New York, New York, between 1946 and 1948.
William P. Gottlieb: Photographs from the Golden Age of Jazz

Billie Holiday not only sang but arranged and composed. Her credits in the latter areas include “Don’t Explain,” “Fine and Mellow,” “I Love My Man,” and “God Bless’ the Child.” She died at age forty-four on July 17, 1959 in New York City.

Billie Holiday is one of several singers photographed by critic and photographer Carl Van Vechten included in Creative Americans: Portraits by Van Vechten, 1932-1964. Browse the Occupational Index to explore more of Van Vechten’s work. She is also featured in the William P. Gottlieb: Photographs from the Golden Age of Jazz collection that documents the jazz scene from 1938 to 1948, primarily in New York City and Washington, D.C. Browse the name index to find more photographs of “Lady Day” and other jazz artists. Listen to Gottlieb’s commentary on Holiday.
Search the American Life Histories, 1936-1940 on the term Apollo for a description of Amateur Night and a spontaneous protest that took place during a live radio broadcast from the famous Harlem theater. In the words of the interviewee, “A Negro show would rather have the plaudits of an Apollo audience than any other applause. For the Apollo is the hard, testing ground of Negro show business, and approval there can make or break an act.” Notice the outmoded language used to describe African Americans in this 1938 interview.
Also, search American Life Histories, 1936-1940 on the term jazz for a variety of stories about the beginning of the jazz era.
Search the Today in History Archive on the terms singer or jazz to find more American Memory material on musical legends including Jelly Roll Morton, W. C. Handy, Ella Fitzgerald, and George Gershwin.
Learn more about what life was like for African Americans during Billie Holiday’s life by examining the following collections and items that cover a range of subjects from Jim Crow to the beginning of the African American Civil Rights Movement.

1. Billie Holiday with William Dufty, Lady Sings the Blues (Garden City, N.Y., Doubleday, 1956). (Return to text)
2. Billie Holiday, Immortal Sessions of Billie Holiday, Storyville, SLP 4002. (Return to text)

Today in History – April 7-External Links

Today’s Weather in History
Today in Earthquake History
This Day in Naval History
Today’s Document from the National Archives
Today’s Events, Births & Deaths –Wikipedia
Today in History by AP
On this Day -1950 to 2005 – Today’s Story–BBC
On This Day: The New York Times
This Day in History –History.com
Today in Canadian History – Canada Channel
History of Britain that took place On This Day
Russia in History –Russiapedia