Sammy Davis Junior

Sammy Davis Jnr was born in Harlem in 1925 to Elvira Sanchez, a Puerto Rican dancer, and Sammy Davis Snr, a black vaudeville entertainer. Elvira's mother was a light-skinned, Manhattan-born Cuban whose miedro al negro (fear of blacks) encouraged Elvira to abandon her son. Raised by his paternal grandmother for his first three years until his father took im on tour, Sammy Jnr was raised by two men - his father and his 'uncle' Will Mastin who led his father's dance troupe.

Sammy Jnr joined Mastin's shows from the age of four and never went to school. He was drafted into the US Army when he was eighteen and his experiences in the service were not happy ones. Suffering abuse by fellow soldiers, he was transferred to an entertainment regiment, and eventually found himself performing in front of some of the same soldiers who had painted the word "coon" on his forehead.

After the war, Davis went solo and signed a recording contract with Decca Records. His first two albums - Starring Sammy Davis, Jnr and Just for Lovers – both sold well and he soon became a headliner in Las Vegas and New York. In the 1960s Davis managed to turn an average Broadway show, Mr Wonderful, into a roaring success. He went on to woo critics in the film Porgy and Bess and, as a member of the high-profile Rat Pack, he hobnobbed with Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Tony Curtis, and Joey Bishop.

With one lazy eye and standing no taller than Sinatra's shoulder (himself no giant), he was never obvious star material. And yet he shone all the same. Possessed of a magnificent crooner's voice that was full of baritone and sugary schmaltz, he was one of 60s America's greatest entertainers. But the highlife also served up pitfalls for Davis, and his marriage to Swedish actress May Britt earned him the vitriol of the Ku Klux Klan. 

While his Rat Pack ways of drink and drugs threatened his health, his lavish lifestyle nearly bankrupted him. Davis became addicted to drugs and alcohol, later developing both liver and kidney trouble which required hospitalization in 1974.

The last fifteen years of Davis's life were conducted at the performer's usual hectic pace. In 1978 he appeared in another Broadway musical, Stop the World - I Want To Get Off. Following the discovery of a throat tumor in 1989, Davis underwent radiation therapy, but died in 1990.