knitwit45 wrote:Hattie McDaniel? Nope, I think Ken's right, it's Louise Beavers. I think we both posted at the same time.
Yes, Ken's got it - it's Louise Beavers.
Her most famous role was as Delilah, opposite Claudette Colbert, in
Imitation of Life. She started in Hollywood as Leatrice Joy's real-life maid, and was tapped to do stand-in and extra work by Joy's studio. On early TV, Beavers was one of the four ladies who played the maid
Beulah, and she was the first maid of the Williams family on the Danny Thomas show (replaced both on
Beulah and Thomas' show by Amanda Randolph).
Beavers, along with neighbor Hattie McDaniel and others, sued their local government to challenge the validity of exclusionary clauses in real estate contracts. It was common up until not too long ago for jurisdictions to put clauses into deeds and leases forbidding sale or leasing to blacks, Jews, and any other groups they deemed undesirable. Beavers and friends won their suit, and their case was used to successfully argue before the Supreme Court for the abolishment of such clauses in legal contracts.