It’s 2016, and Yale University acquires a priceless piece of the Harlem Renaissance. In 1932, young artist E. Simms Campbell drew his “Night-Club Map of Harlem,” a who’s-who illustration of the neighborhood hotspots. Drawn cartoon-style, we see Cab Calloway singing at the Cotton Club. There’s Glady Bentley’s Clam House, with Gladys tickling the ivories in a tuxedo. And Smalls’ Paradise, with its “café au lait girls” and dancing waiters.
Campbell’s affectionate tribute to Harlem, and the jazz music it cultivated, caught readers’ attention in the first issue of Esquire magazine. He’d been recommended by artist Russell Patterson. “I know a fantastically talented colored kid,” Patterson said, “if you don’t draw the color line.” Thus Campbell became the first African-American illustrator for mainstream white publications.
Whether in Esquire, or the New Yorker, Cosmopolitan, or Redbook, Campbell’s art indeed crossed the color line. He subtly and subversively poked fun at so-called problems among affluent whites – an impatient husband waiting for his wife, a man caught cheating at a Whites-only nightclub, the crises in choosing wallpaper. Meanwhile, in Black-focused publications, Campbell addressed the deeper issues of creating a Black identity and the power of jazz. Always a jazz advocate, Campbell authored a chapter on blues music for the 1939 book Jazzmen, a study of jazz history and evolution.
Campbell’s “Night-Club Map of Harlem” has also enjoyed a long career. Cab Calloway included it in his autobiography. Ken Burns published it in the companion book to his film Jazz. It was published twice in National Geographic and was displayed at the Smithsonian. Now at Yale, it’s available to historians for research.
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