Nichols, Nichelle – Legendary Role Model
By
John C Abercrombie
Today is day 24 of the 31 day tribute to Black women we should all know. Our focus is on Nichelle Nichols who inspired many and broke the stereotype that all Black female roles were that of a maid or some other subservient position.
The world morns the death of Nichelle Nichols who portrayed one of the pioneers of stereotype breaking Lt Nyota Uhura in the popular Star Trek and in sequels. While this portrays a point in time that we anticipate, it was a first for the American audience to see a Black female playing a role that did not put them in the stereotypical role of a maid. In fact, this is an exclamation made by the well-known actor Whoopi Goldberg who exclaimed to anyone that was listening that there was a Black woman on tv, and she was not playing a maid.
Since the beginning of time in the entertainment industry Blacks have been placed in subservient roles without any opportunity to show any competence or intellect. This has contributed greatly to the image of the Black as somehow incompetent, lazy, shiftless and to put it bluntly dumb.
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The world morns the death of Nichelle Nichols who portrayed one of the pioneers of stereotype breaking, Lt Nyota Uhura in the popular Star Trek and in sequels. While this portrays a point in time that we anticipate, it was a first for the American audience to see a Black female playing a role that did not put them in the stereotypical role of a maid. In fact, this is an exclamation made by the well-known actor Whoopi Goldberg who exclaimed to anyone that was listening that there was a Black woman on tv, and she was not playing a maid.
Since the beginning of time in the entertainment industry Blacks have been placed in subservient roles without any opportunity to show any competence or intellect. This has contributed greatly to the image of the Black as somehow incompetent, lazy, shiftless and to put it bluntly dumb.
The role was groundbreaking and required much effort on the part of the creator, Gene Roddenberry to continue the series. The Network continued to fight the image kowtowing to the expectations of the unconfirmed aviator of the day. That being that the public would not stand for the depiction of a Black and a woman being equal to other members of the cast. This is a sad commentary on the state of race equity in America and we have not completely evolved on this issue.
When first pitched as a series, the network pushed back and insisted that the depiction was three hundred years in the future. This is why it is depicted as in the 23rd century. Sad but true.
Nichelle Nichols was born with the name of Grace Dell Nichols on December 28, 1932, one of ten children born to Samuel Earl ad Lishia Parks Nichols. Her father was a factory worker and won election as Mayor and later chief magistrate. Her mother was a homemaker. Nichelle disliked her name and asked her parents for a new one and the offered Nichelle with their blessings. It meant “Victorious Maiden.
After high school Nichols studied in New York City and Los Angeles, California. Nichelle had a dream to sing and dance and took every opportunity to perform. She had an early break in Kicks and Co., an ill-fated story about Playboy magazine. Although the play closed early, she had attracted the attention of Hugh Hefner, publisher of Playboy magazine who booked her for this Chicago club. Se also appeared in the role of Carmen for Chicago stock company production of Carmen Jones and a New York production of Porgy and Bess. Between singing and acting she also found work as a model.
One of her classmates accopaied her to her auditions, Marla Gibbs who most of us know as Florence fro the Jeffersons.
Nichelle Nichols was featured on the cover of Ebony magazine in January 1967 and was featured in two articles within five years. She toured the United States, Canada, and Europe as a singer with the legendary Duke Ellington and the Lionel Hampton bands.
On the West Coast, she appeared in The Roar of the Greasepaint and For My People and she garnered high praise for her performance in the James Baldwin play Blues for Mister Charlie. Prior to being cast as Lieutenant Uhura in Star Trek, in 1964, Nichols was a guest actor on television producer Gene Roddenberry’s first series The Lieutenant in an episode, “To Set It Right”, which dealt with racial prejudice.
Nichols was one of the first Black women featured in a major television series, playing a bridge officer. There was even an order not to deliver her fan mail which was equal that of the top stars. It seems that no effort is spared to deprive Black actors of deserved acclaim. She learned this from mailroom staff, but since there was no order to keep her from visiting the mailroom and claiming this mail, she did so.
With the absence of fan support and constantly having her speaking lines diminished Nichols decided to leave the show and return to her first love singing and dancing. She had advised Gene Roddenberry that she was leaving the show. Gene had asked her to think it over the weekend. That weekend, she was introduced to an ardent fan, the Civil Rights leader Dr Martin Luther King Jr. who she advised that she was leaving the show. King recoiled in horror and pointed out the benefits of what the show offered, a positive role model for so many people. After much deliberation, Nichols rescinded her request to leave the show and in fact teamed up with NASA and recruited many women and minorities to join the valuable space program. Among those that she helped recruit were astronaut Sally Ride, the first woman in space as well as Judy Resnick the second woman in space. She helped recruit Dr Mae Jamerson, the first Black woman in space as well as Guy Bluford, the first Black American man in space. Also, Dr Ron McNair the second Black American in space and was killed in the Challenger disaster.
Notice the above paragraph talks about the first Black Americans in space. The honor of the first Black man in space belongs to Cuban cosmonaut Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez, who flew abord the Soviet Soyuz Becoming the first Black, the first Latin and the first Cuban in space on September 18, 1980.
Nichelle describes the meeting with Dr Martin Luther King, Jr in the following excerpt. Keep in mind that she was told that a fan wanted to meet her.
I thought it was a Trekkie, and so I said, ‘Sure.’ I looked across the room and whoever the fan was had to wait because there was Dr. Martin Luther King walking towards me with this big grin on his face. He reached out to me and said, ‘Yes, Ms. Nichols, I am your greatest fan.’ He said that Star Trek was the only show that he, and his wife Coretta, would allow their three little children to stay up and watch. [She told King about her plans to leave the series because she wanted to take a role that was tied to Broadway. I never got to tell him why, because he said, ‘you cannot, you cannot…for the first time on television, we will be seen as we should be seen every day, as intelligent, quality, beautiful, people who can sing dance, and can go to space, who are professors, lawyers.” Dr. King Jr went further stating “If you leave, that door can be closed because your role is not a black role and is not a female role; he can fill it with anybody even an alien.” In these days almost anything was acceptable except showing a Black person being competent, intelligent, or even successful. This slight permeates our history as well.
The show lived on after being cancelled in 1969. Nichols continued to provide the voice of Lt Uhura in the animated series and in one episode, “The Lorelei Signal,” she assumed command of the Enterprise. She wrote of frustration in er autobiography about frustration that it was not done in the original series. She co-stared in six Star Trek films. Surviving are four cast members, William Shatner, George Takei, and Walter Koenig.
Nichelle Nichols was a person of great and diversified talent. Singing, dancing, acting, and taking an active role as a role model. She influenced the depictions of Blacks in the media which before had always depicted clowns, buffoons, and slow-witted characters. Thank God most of those are gone!
Always dignified and in control, she was a fan favorite and I have pictures of my grandson and her after meeting on a flight. We owe a lot to the memories of our dear departed sister. RIP
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Nichelle Nichols – More than a Role Model
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Nichelle Nichols, trailblazing ‘Star Trek’ actress, dies at 89
Actress and singer Nichelle Nichols, best known for her groundbreaking portrayal of Lt. Nyota Uhura in “Star Trek: The Original Series,” has died at age 89, according to a statement from her son, Kyle Johnson.
Nichols portrayed communications officer Lt. Nyota Uhura in the “Star Trek” TV series and many of its film offshoots.
When “Star Trek” began in 1966, Nichols was a television rarity: a Black woman in a notable role on a prime-time television series. There had been African-American women on TV before, but they often played domestic workers and had small roles; Nichols’ Uhura was an integral part of the multicultural “Star Trek” crew.
The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. called it “the first non-stereotypical role portrayed by a Black woman in television history.”
Nichols is widely known for participating in one of the first interracial kisses on US television when her character kissed James T. Kirk, portrayed by White Canadian actor William Shatner. In an interview with CNN in 2014, Nichols said the kiss scene “changed television forever, and it also changed the way people looked at one another.”
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Nichelle Nichols went where no Black woman had gone before and, in the process, upgraded the stereotypical role of Blacks and women to one of dignity and ability. It was not an easy journey, but one that all should be grateful for. This points out the value of wholesome role models and we are affected by that in an exceptionally good way. RIP