Highly scarce vintage signature in blue felt-tip pen on a 3x5-inch off-white card, part of a massive horde of autographs acquired in-person in New York City in the 1970s and 1980s. In good condition and nice for matting with a favorite photograph. Beautiful, pioneering African-American actress Fredi Washington's fair skin and green eyes made her the ideal Peola in 1934's controversial classic Imitation of Life. For other films, most notably The Emperor Jones (1933) with Paul Robeson, she was forced by studio executives to wear make-up to darken her skin.  When she began to resent it and decided to try her hand on the Broadway stage, she was told that she didn't "look Black enough" to compete with stars like Josephine Baker, Nina Mae McKinney and Ethel Waters.  Abandoning acting, she devoted her energy to activism, heading the Negro Actors Guild and helping fellow African-American performers get a fair chance in the entertainment industry.

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