Ruby Dee

Vocation

Notable

Family

American actress on Broadway, in films and on TV. Well known for her acting ability and her civil rights and humanitarian causes. She starred in the 1959 award-winning Broadway drama "A Raisin In the Sun," and reprised her role in the 1961 film. Dee was the third of four children born to Nathaniel Wallace, a Pennsylvania railroad porter, and Gladys Hightower. Her mother left the family to follow a preacher and the girl grew up in Harlem, New York, raised by her father and stepmother, Emma Benson, a former teacher and sometime activist. Learning early in life that moral and political commitment strengthens the character, she picketed neighborhood shops that didn't hire blacks. Ruby was drawn to theater in high school and won a role in the American Negro Theater's production of "On Strivers' Row" in her freshman year at Hunter College. Ruby joined teenage Harry Belefonte and other talents in Harlem's thriving arts community in the 1940's. In 1945 she was cast in "Jeb" a Broadway show starring newcomer Ossie Davis. In 1989 Dee and Davis worked together in Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing." Ruby had a short lived marriage to Frankie Dee who worked in promotions for a distillery. The marriage fell apart in 1945. After finding that they had much in common, Ruby married Ossie Davis, six years her senior, in December 1948. They have three children, Nora, an educator, Guy, a blues musician and Hasna, a middle-school assistant principal. They have seven grandchildren. Dee and Davis have always striven to keep family structure; even when traveling they ate as a family with the TV turned off so they could converse. Keeping their long-term marriage vigorous, they have some rousing fights but absolutely adore each other. Together, they have participated in political activism and the fight for civil rights. Their social mission is to break down racial barriers. Their dual autobiography "In This Life Together" was published in 1998. Dee’s beloved husband and partner, Ossie Davis, died at age 87 on February 4, 2005. He was found dead in his hotel room in Miami Beach, FL, most likely of natural causes. Their son said that Davis had been suffering from heart problems and had just recovered from a recent bout of pneumonia. Although we have no birth time for him, Davis’ New York Times obituary stated that “Raiford Chatman Davis was born on Dec. 18, 1917, in Cogdell, Ga. He was the oldest of five children of Kince Charles Davis and the former Laura Cooper.” Link to Wikipedia biography