13 Facts About Catherine Basie

Catherine Basie was a dancer who performed with the Whitman Sisters and starred as a featured dancer in musical short films called soundies.

Catherine Basie married the jazz composer and bandleader Count Basie and was an advocate for civil rights and for children with disabilities.

Catherine Basie was born on April 11,1914, in Cleveland, Ohio.

Catherine Basie was a champion backstroke swimmer in high school and an Olympic hopeful.

Unable to adequately train for the 1936 Olympics due to a lack of financial support, Catherine ended her athletic career and began pursuing dancing.

In early 1943, Count Catherine Basie claimed that the couple had been recently engaged, but not yet married.

The couple had one daughter, Diane Catherine Basie, who was born in Cleveland, Ohio 1944 with cerebral palsy.

Catherine Basie died of a heart attack on April 11,1983 at her home in Freeport.

Catherine Basie was an honorary member of Lambda Kappa Mu, a national sorority of African American business and professional women established in 1937.

Catherine Basie helped raise money for civil rights organizations such as the NAACP, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, National Conference of Christians and Jews, and co-chaired a committees to honor civil rights activists such as Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

In 1953, Catherine Basie was traveling in Ohio with her young child and maid and was denied entrance to a local restaurant.

The restaurant claimed it could not serve her because it was closed, but Catherine Basie observed other patrons entering the establishment.

Catherine Basie contacted Barbee William Durham, executive secretary of the Columbus NAACP.