Developments in the world of Florence Mills lore may not happen at the frenetic pace of the modern media but there are plenty of things happening from time to time so I hope to update this page regularly.
The previous editions of news can be seen still at Archive No. 1, No. 2 , No.3 , No.4 , No.5 , No.6 , No.7 , No.8 and No.9
Silk
stockings in the Florence Mills shade revisited
Fashionable ladies
could afford the expensive silk stockings (see below) but for the less affluent,
you could always dye your available stockings. Here is how to do it:
(Note Florence's name on the list)
T
Death
of Lena Horne (Click
for full story)
Lena Horne was one
of the legendary true greats of Black entertainment
The last surviving link in the chain of those who stepped into Florence
Mills' shoes in Lew
Leslie's shows:
Ethel Waters
- and briefly Josephine
Baker (Plantation
Revue, 1924)
Mabel Mercer
(Blackbirds of 1927)
Aida Ward
and Adelaide Hall
(Blackbirds of 1928-29)
Ethel Waters
again (Blackbirds of 1930)
Valaida Snow
(Blackbirds of 1934 - 35)
Lavaida Carter
(Blackbirds of 1936-37 - sister of Valaida!)
Lena Horne
(Blackbirds of 1939)
Perhaps they're all playing a celestial version together now
T
Silk stockings in the Florence Mills shade !
So great was the craze for anything to do with Florence Mills in London in the 1920s that it was reported fashionable ladies would ask for silk stockings in the "Florence Mills" shade. The recent availability of on-line readable texts from newspapers of the era has now allowed me to discover that as late as 1930 this was also the case way down under in Australia - Here is a 1930 advt from the Brisbane Courier, offering stockings in a variety of shades including "Florence Mills":
In England, those who couldn't afford
the expensive new stockings could dye their existing stockings using
"Florence Mills" dye provided by the company Whitaker &
Company. Samples are still preserved at Hull City Museum - see Winner
Stocking Dye
That's all for now,
folks