We first met Lou Blackwell Robbins here, giving summer art lessons to children at the Colored Graded School in 1936. I still have not been able to find her in county records, but several Journal and Globe articles published over the next year or so provide some clues to her life.

In this 14 November 1936 piece, Robbins’ vocation is listed as “artist.” She had given a demonstration on making pottery to members of the Black Creek Home Demonstration Club, which met at the home of Mrs. L.D. Tomlinson. (Sallie Owens Tomlinson and Louise Rainwater, who demonstrated cake-making to the club, were white women. Robbins’ invitation into Tomlinson’s home to demonstrate pottery-making must have been a remarkable event.) Robbins had also founded the Professional Women’s Art Club in Wilson, whose officers drew from Black Wilson’s upper crust (such as it was.)

Journal and Guide (Norfolk, Va.), 14 November 1936.

Three months later, Robbins was in Norfolk, Virginia, lecturing and exhibiting her work. A March 13 article “explained something of her life and her past experience in the field of art and her ambitions for the remainder of her life.”

There’s a lot to digest.

We learn that Robbins graduated from Wilson High School (later known as Darden High) in 1934. She had two adopted daughters. Her interest in art was encouraged by a high school teacher, leading her to give up “medicine and a career as a doctor.” (What?) She produced art across multiple genres, was a lecturer and a teacher, and was writing a history of Negroes in North Carolina. She sculpted in North Carolina clay and had carved busts of numerous prominent men.

Journal and Guide (Norfolk, Va.), 13 March 1937.

Journal and Guide (Norfolk, Va.), 8 May 1937.

Journal and Guide (Norfolk, Va.), 19 June 1937.

In late summer, Lou Blackwell Robbins returned to Norfolk to compete in a talent contest at the Booker-T Theatre. Once again, we get a complex picture of Robbins’ talents. She told the reporter that she had been inspired by Voo Doo Fire, a book given her by an Army veteran, to make percussion instruments by hand, assisted by children in Saint John A.M.E. Zion’s music program. [Richard A. Loederer’s Voodoo Fire in Haiti, published in 1935?] Captivated by the instruments, the children formed the Jungle Babies Band and booked performances at Saint John and Vick’s Casino, the nightclub operated by Samuel H. Vick Jr. in his father’s old Globe Theatre space in the Odd Fellows Building on East Nash Street. Inspired by the “delighted” audience response, Robbins went to Norfolk to try to book the Jungle Babies there. Encouraged to enter the contest, she secured Eloise Hunter as an accompanist on piano and took third place. However, the reporter’s description of the performance is just snarky enough to cast doubt on Robbins’ musical prowess.

Journal and Guide (Norfolk, Va.), 11 September 1937.

Lou Blackwell Robbins’ time in Norfolk was not entirely positive. A lengthy 13 August 1938 article about troubles at Queen Street Baptist Church mentioned that Robbins had filed unspecified charges against its pastor, Rev. P.P. Eaton, resulting in his reprimand.

I’ve found no other reference to Lou Blackwell Robbins. Was she a Wilson native? Who were her husband and children? If she left Wilson, where did she go? What became of her art and writings?

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• Mrs. E.H. Diggs — Mary Grant Diggs. In the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 205 Vick Street, barber Edgar H. Diggs, 49, at Hines Barber Shop; wife Mary, 39, teacher in Stantonsburg; and children Edgar, 13, Mary, 9, and Preston, 11.
• Mrs. A.M. Bullock
• Mrs. A.R. Peacock — perhaps, Eloise Reavis Peacock.
• Mrs. A.M. Fisher
• Mrs. Elizabeth Bordy — Elizabeth Brodie, who, in fact, was not yet married. On 17 April 1937, Elizabeth Brodie, 20, of Wilson, daughter of Arthur and Anna Brodie, married Luther E. McKeithan, 25, son of Henry and Sarah McKeithan of Cumberland County, in Wilson. A.M.E. minister John C. Coaxum performed the ceremony in the presence of Rhoda McMillan, Alex McMillan and Sallie Suggs.
• “Biddie” Willets
• Dick Sanders
• Louis Thomas — Louis Sanford Thomas Jr. In the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 715 East Green, Louis Thomas, 43, building carpenter; wife Lillie, 33; and children Louis Jr., 16, Charlie H., 14, and Van Jewel, 12.
• Jerry Lee Cook — Jerry Lee Cooke Jr.
• Edgar Gerald — in the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 910 East Green, Edgar Gerald, 48, tobacco warehouse laborer, born in Mullens, S.C.; wife Rebecca, 37, born in Norfolk[, Virginia]; children Bernice, 17, Edgar, 16, and Barbara, 4; and roomer John Sharpe, 22, hotel bellboy.
• Bob Speights — in the 1940 census of Wilson, Wilson County: at 624 Viola, Theodore Speight, 38, barber; wife Marie, 34; children Robert, 13, Evangeline, 10, Clyde, 8, and Randolph, 2; and lodger Charlotte Tate, 32, servant.
• Samuel H. Vick Jr. — the enterprising Sam Vick Jr. was a chemist, a cosmetics salesman, a booking agent, and a nightclub owner.