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Butterfly McQueen, Actress born

Butterfly McQueen

On this date, we celebrate the birth of Butterfly McQueen in 1911.  She was a Black actress.

Thelma McQueen (her birth name) was the daughter of a stevedore and a domestic worker.  She was an only child from Tampa, Florida, and got the name Butterfly after appearing in a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, in which she danced in the Butterfly Ballet.   Her most known acting role was portrayed as Scarlett O’Hara’s squeaky-voiced maid, Prissy, in Gone With The Wind.

Although Gone With The Wind went on to become a huge success, McQueen found it difficult to find work as an actress. She was often typecast in roles as maids and said, “I didn’t mind playing a maid the first time because I thought that was how you got into the business. But after I did the same thing over and over, I resented it. I didn’t mind being funny, but I didn’t like being stupid.”

McQueen could not attend Gone With The Wind’s premiere because it was held in a whites-only theater, but she was a guest of honor at its 50th-anniversary celebration in 1989. In 1975 at age 64, McQueen earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from New York’s City College.  In 1980 she won an Emmy for her performance in a children’s production, The Seven Wishes of a Rich Kid.

Butterfly McQueen died at age 84 on December 22, 1995, at Doctors Hospital in Augusta, from burns sustained when a kerosene heater she attempted to light malfunctioned and burst into flames.  McQueen donated her body to medical science and remembered the Freedom From Religion Foundation in her will.

To become an Actor or Actress