After working as early as the 1910s as a band vocalist, Hattie McDaniel debuted as a maid in The Golden West. Her maid-mammy characters became steadily more assertive, showing up first in Judge Priest and becoming pronounced in Alice Adams. In this one, directed by George Stevens and aided and abetted by star Katharine Hepburn, she makes it clear she has little use for her employers' pretentious status seeking. By The Mad Miss Manton she actually tells off her socialite employer Barbara Stanwyck and her snooty friends. This path extends into the greatest role of her career, Mammy in Gone with the Wind. Here she is, in a number of ways, superior to most of the white folk surrounding her. From that point here roles unfortunately descended, with her characters becoming more and more menial. She played on the "Amos and Andy" and Eddie Cantor radio shows in the 1930s and 1940s; the title in her own radio show "Beulah" (1947-51), and the same part on TV (Beulah). Her part in "Gone With The Wind" won her the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, the first black to win an Academy Award.



Gone with the Wind (1939): $1,000 a week

Arguably the first African-American woman to sing on radio (1915, with Professor George Morrison's Negro Orchestra, Denver, CO); first African-American to be buried in Los Angeles' Rosedale Cemetery Was the first African-American to win an Academy Award. She won as Best Actress in a Supporting Role for her role of Mammy in Gone with the Wind (1939). She became the first African-American to attend the Academy Awards as a guest, not a servant. Sister of Sam McDaniel. She willed her Oscar to Howard University, but the Oscar was lost during the race riots at Howard during the 1960s. It has never been found. When the date of the Atlanta premiere of Gone with the Wind (1939) approached, McDaniel told director Victor Fleming she would not be able to make it, when in actuality she did not want to cause trouble due to the virulent racism that was rampant in Atlanta at the time. Is a honorary member of Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, Incorporated Pictured on a USA 39¢ commemorative postage stamp in the Black Heritage series, issued 25 January 2006. Her Academy Award was presented by Fay Bainter. Is one of five African-American actresses to receive the Academy Award. The others, in chronological order, are Whoopi Goldberg for Ghost (1990), Halle Berry for Monster's Ball (2001), Jennifer Hudson for Dreamgirls (2006) and Mo'Nique for Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire (2009). She had a one-time intimate affair with actress Tallulah Bankhead, according to chronicler of the Hollywood underground Kenneth Anger.