11. Aunt Jemima appeared on radio with programs of her own in the 1930s
Beginning in 1930, and continuing through the decade into the early 1940s, Aunt Jemima could be heard on the radio in her own short program. Several women provided the voice of the advertising icon, many of them White. Among them was a woman who had portrayed Black characters in plays, film shorts, and theatricals since the 1920s, using the stage name Aunt Jemima. She was an Italian-American from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania named Tess Gardella. Gardella achieved critical success playing the role of Queenie in a stage production of Showboat, in blackface. That performance earned her the role of Aunt Jemima on radio, in a series of programs that included musical entertainment for the audience.
Gardella once sued NBC for using the name Aunt Jemima on a radio broadcast, claiming her long use of the name gave her exclusive rights to its use. Despite the character being entirely fictional she won her suit, receiving over $100,000 dollars in a settlement. Nonetheless, several other actresses appeared as Aunt Jemima on radio broadcasts. In the 1940s the radio series Aunt Jemima gained an audience from rebroadcasts of the originals, leading to a revival of the series in the early 1950s, featuring Amanda Randolph in the starring role. Randolph became a pioneer of early television, one of the earliest Black performers with a starring role in a regular series. She voiced Aunt Jemima for radio commercials, but her appearance as other characters in television made her unsuitable for the role on screen.
