Photograph of the New York production cast for Green Pastures: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

Black and white photograph (a), with sleeve (b), of the entire all-black NY cast of the production of “Green Pastures,” taken in Denver. Landscape orientation, elongated. Depicts entire cast of "Green Pastures”, men, women, and children in formal dress attire in front of the Broadway Theatre in Denver Colorado. Some are sitting in the front row, or kneeling, while most are standing in two lines in the background. In the background, to the left, is the Hotel Cosmopolitan Coffee Shoppe glass store front, in the center is the archway entrance to the Broadway Theatre with a banner that reads "THE REWARD OF TWO YEARS WAITING/ "THE GREEN PASTURES"/ COMPLETE ORIGINAL NEW YORK PRODUCTION./ CAST and "HEAVENLY CHOIR" in the center with "AT LAST!" in the top left hand corner, "ONE/ WEEK ONLY/ Commencing Monday/ JULY 25" in the bottom left hand corner, and "Matinees/ Wednesday/ and Saturday/ at 2:20 Sharp" in the bottom right hand corner, all below the neon lights reading "N.Y. CAST." On the right, is the store from for Eugene M. Ardelt Flowers, with an elaborate awning. Along the bottom of the photograph, in white type, reads "MEMBERS OF THE CAST AND CREW AND HEAVENLY CHOIR OF THE GREEN PASTURES COMPANY - BRAODWAY THEATRE, DENVER COLORADO JULY 25-30, 1932" with "Rocky Mt. Photo Co./ 3257 - DENVER" in white type in the bottom right hand corner. Entire photograph is bordered by white. On reverse, entire back is covered with tape (masking tape underneath large strips of yellow tape). Yellow tape has three long horizontal pieces along the back of the photograph, with seven shorter vertical pieces laid perpendicular.

The sleeve (b) is a long flat rectangular piece of cardboard with remnants of old masking tape at intervals. There are extensive handwritten notes along the length of the sleeve. Please see Notes, Text Entries field for full text.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: 1932
• Photograph by: Rocky Mt. Photo Co., American
• Type: gelatin silver prints
• Type: portraits
• Medium: silver and photographic gelatin on photographic paper with cardboard
• Dimensions: H x W (Image): 10 × 31 15/16 in. (25.4 × 81.1 cm)
• Place depicted: Denver, Colorado, United States, North and Central America
• Topic: African American
• Topic: Drama (Theatre)
• Topic: Identity
• Topic: Religion
• Object number: 2014.167.2ab
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gifted with pride from Ellen Brooks
• 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: Public domain Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.