Lester Bankhead
*Lester Bankhead was born on this date in 1912. He was a Black architect.
He was the eldest of six children from Union, South Carolina. Lester Oliver Bankhead’s parents were John Hayes Bankhead and Pearl Eugenia Eskew. He had hoped to attend Tuskegee Institute, but the lack of financial support forced him to seek training elsewhere. He wrote to Voorhees College in Denmark, South Carolina, and was later enrolled in 1937. He graduated from Voorhees with a degree in agriculture and a certificate in carpentry in 1941. After graduating from college, Bankhead was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1942.
Upon completing basic training, his unit was ordered to assist in the liberation of North Africa. After being discharged from the Army, Bankhead moved to Los Angeles and settled within the Central Avenue community. He attended the Los Angeles City College, Otis Art Institute, and Los Angeles Trade Technical College. Bankhead worked various jobs and eventually began his own practice in the 1950s. Bankhead was among a handful of pioneering Black architects in Los Angeles in the 1950s.
Although he faced the racial prejudice of his time, he could obtain work from Hollywood celebrities, such as actor Lorne Greene, Kelly Lang, a Los Angeles news anchor; and H.B. Barnum, noted music producer and arranger for Frank Sinatra, Smokey Robinson & the Miracles and others.
Although Bankhead designed homes, his emphasis as an architect was church design. Bankhead’s most notable buildings include the Chapel of Faith Baptist Church, Greater Life Missionary Church, and New Jerusalem Missionary Baptist Church. Voorhees College honored Bankhead as one of “100 distinguished Alumni” at the Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education in 1988. Bankhead died in Los Angeles in 1997.
