Promotional Cotton Club mallet owned by Cab Calloway: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

A promotional Cotton Club noisemaker mallet owned by Cab Calloway. The mallet has a spherical head and is a natural wood color. The handle is long, thin and natural wood colored. It has blacked text printed at the center that reads [COTTON CLUB / B'WAY at 48th STREET Circle 7-1000 / BILL ROBINSON & CAB CALLOWAY / AND AN ALL STAR SEPIAN REVUE]. The text is bookended with a bands of a red square pattern.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: ca. 1937
• Manufactured by: Unidentified
• Distributed by: Cotton Club, American, 1923 - 1940
• Owned by: Cab Calloway, American, 1907 - 1994
• Subject of: Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, American, 1878 - 1949
• Type: hammers (percussion beaters)
• Type: noisemakers
• Medium: ink on wood with dye
• Dimensions: H x W x D: 1 × 1 × 7 7/8 in. (2.5 × 2.5 × 20 cm)
• Place used: New York City, New York, United States, North and Central America
• Topic: African American
• Topic: Advertising
• Topic: Band (Music)
• Topic: Composers (Musicians)
• Topic: Conductors (Musicians)
• Topic: Dance
• Topic: Jazz (Music)
• Topic: Nightlife
• Object number: A2015.273.1.4
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Cabella Calloway Langsam
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The underlying object's rights statement is: No known copyright restrictions Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.