Herb Jeffries | Visiting with Huell Howser | KCET

[@frankmccoy3694]

Old Huell just helped so many people get their lives changed by just an interview with forgotten people like Herb Jeffries .He was amazing!

[@janiceanderson1328]

That was so informative.

[@lesthebest3171]

May Hugh and Herb forever rest in piece. The were both legendary icons of Americana.

[@catherinehendrickson2809]

Many more adventures with your father. Thank You both.

[@androlibre9661]

I got into Herb Jefferies after the movie POsse came out in 1993.

[@verasaville145]

This is wonderful. My brother and I were great cowboy fans but we missed out on Herb.

[@duanebrodnick5212]

There was talk a few years ago of someone working on a book about Mr. Jeffries. Has anyone heard whether this book or any book was written?

[@nikox703]

Legendary.

[@jimprice5681]

Great man.

[@vegas1a]

Use the KZbin search for Herb Jeffries to catch at least 2 of cowboy movies, they are pretty good.

[@RayPointerChannel]

Huell Howser's telling of how Herb Jeffries westerns came about is inaccurate. "The powers that be" in the studios did not make this decision. In the documentary on KZbin, "Herb Jeffries:A Colored LIke" he tells in detail of how he was first introduced to segregation in the south after appearing with Louis Armstrong in Chicago. When they played in the south, Herb saw the segregated movie houses and noticed that they played the standard Westerns with the white cowboy stars. That is where HE got the idea of making Westerns for Black audiences. When they arrived in Los Angeles, he was connected with a low budget film producer, who jumped at the idea, saying "MAN I"LL TAKE EVERYONE YOU MAKE!" That was a given since no one had thought of this before. They had trouble casting the lead character since the established Black actors were committed to the big studios. The only ones they could get for supporting roles were Clarence Muse and Spencer Williams. Jeffries not only wrote his own songs, he ended up playing the lead as well. THAT is the story.

[@scj3188]

Turns out this singing "black " cowboy wasn't black at all! He was Italian and Cuban. Talk about "Hollywood magic" lol

[@mohamadfaiz6935]

This was aired in 2000

[@scj3188]

He was Italian and Cuban not black!

[@DigitalDiscusVideo]

Herb was a close personal friend of mine. He told me that his father was Italian (Sicilian) and his mother was Irish. In the early days of his career, he represented himself as a "Creole from New Orleans" in order to be accepted and hired by Black bands. They played his kind of music and he wanted to be part of it. Consequently, the public perceived him as Black and he never did anything to disabuse them of that notion. He saw the disparity of the treatment of Blacks in those days and, in his own way, became an advocate for civil rights.