January 25, 1896 - November 1, 1927

• Florence Mills (born Florence Winfrey) was one of the greatest entertainers and singing, dancing jazz performers the world has ever seen.

• She was one of the all-time greatest stars of the black theatre, the first black international female superstar of the Twentieth century and a major figure of the Harlem Renaissance

• Florence Mills was steeped in the traditions of  African-based black music and black dance that gave the world the Spirituals ('sorrow songs'), the Blues, Ragtime, Jazz and the basis of much of today's popular culture

• She was also a truly lovable, charitable, socially and intellectually aware woman, who spoke out for the rights of her fellow African Americans.

• Florence Mills is largely forgotten and neglected today, mainly because the primitive recording techniques of the early twentieth century couldn't capture her remarkable voice, and she was never filmed, so no record of her performance remains.

• The purpose of this site is to help reclaim for her the status and respect her remarkable talents and heroic personality warrant, in the eyes of the world and of her fellow African-Americans, to whom she was so important in the 1920s.

•  Check the links below to learn about Florence's true greatness, or  read The Book !

---

TTT

1 November 2024 will see the 97th anniversary of Florence Mills death, with the biggest funeral Harlem had ever seen.
Below is the song Florence dedicated to her washerwoman mother Nellie, sung here by Florence's dedicated contemporary fan Elisabeth Welch
Silver Rose
Florence was known as the Queen of Happiness, with love for all and hate for none.
For her fellow African Americans today one way to honor her memory would be to vote for a woman of color, Kamala Harris, to defeat the hatred being preached by Donald Trump .

TTT
To see what was happening in Florence's world in a particular month of the year click on that month's box below
 and then click "Home" in that month to return

January

February

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

This site is © copyright property of  Bill Egan. Content created by me can be used subject to appropriate acknowledgement including URL of this site. To contact me or make suggestions (hopefully polite) e-mail me at: (replacing  [AT] with @  )
Bill [AT] FlorenceMills.com
For information on Florence Mills: INFO [AT] FlorenceMills.com
Problems accessing content, or broken links etc: Webmaster [AT] FlorenceMills.com
If you need help finding your way around try the Site Map
Gwen Farrar.html