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Honoring,
memorializing and building upon the historic 1958 continental tour of Africa by the Playmakers Guild of Florida A&M University.
Africa 2008
Within
America’s Department of State and under the auspices of the United States Cultural Presentations Program, which acted
as a component of President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Special International Cultural Exchange Program, a Florida university
was selected for a special honor.
Occurring
during a particularly tense time of the Cold War between America and the Soviet Union, the Florida A&M University Playmakers
Guild, based on their excellence, was selected to act as ambassadors for the American people by conducting a continental tour
of Africa. As selectees, the FAMU Playmakers Guild was part of a truly elite company of cultural ambassadors. Listed below
are the participants during the six-month period that included the Playmakers Guild tour of Africa:
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Catholic University Theatre, tour
of Latin America
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Golden Gate Quartet, tour of the Near & Far East
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Woody Herman Band, tour of Latin America
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Juilliard Orchestra, tour of Western Europe
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Juilliard String Quartet, tour of Europe & Near East
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New York City Ballet, tour of Far East
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Philadelphia Symphony, tour of Europe
The
FAMU Playmakers Guild proceeded in the fall of 1958 on their tour which was unprecedented for a historically black college
or university in the United States. The Playmakers began their historic tour of performances on October 2, 1958, in Monrovia
and ended them in Cairo on November 27, 1958. At the tour’s conclusion, they had performed 47 separate productions of
“Medea,” 18 productions of “Fixin’s,” 32 productions of “Happy Journey” and 19 productions
of “The Flattering Word.”
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African Countries visited in 1958, click the
country name for an overview of the nation:
As
the 50thanniversary [2018] of the untimely death of one of FAMU’s finest [Irene Edmonds] arrives in less
than a decade, that year will also be the 60thanniversary of her participation in the African Tour conducted with
her husband, S. Randolph Edmonds, and the FAMU Playmakers Guild, as well as the 110th anniversary of her birth.
In 2008 we declared that surely the time is right for this remarkable woman to be honored and the African Tour, as a monumental
achievement in FAMU history [and notable achievement for the State of Florida and America], to not only be highlighted but
celebrated.
AFRICA 2008 attempts
to do just that.
*
The 1958 FAMU Playmakers Guild:
Faculty
S. Randolph Edmonds
Irene C. Edmonds
Students
Barbara Meade Edwards [Anders], of
Tallahassee
John Black, of Charlotte,
N.C.
Berthine Walden-Jordan, of Jacksonville
Roger Baker, of Pensacola
Gwendolyn Benyard [Gilyard], of Doerun,
Ga
Juanita Fordham-Jackson, of Tallahassee
Dorothy Taylor, of Tallahassee
William Larkins, unknown hometown
Raymond Aranha, of Miami
John Alexander, Jr., of Charlotte,
N.C.
[local child actors were selected in each African town]
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