27 Facts About Jester Hairston

Jester Joseph Hairston was an American composer, songwriter, arranger, choral conductor and actor.

Jester Hairston was regarded as a leading expert on black spirituals and choral music.

Jester Hairston was very young when his father was killed in a job-related accident.

Jester Hairston was raised by his grandmother while his mother worked.

Jester Hairston heard his grandmother and her friends talking and singing about plantation life and became determined to preserve this history through music.

Jester Hairston initially majored in landscape architecture at Massachusetts Agricultural College in the 1920s.

Jester Hairston became involved in various church choirs and choral groups, and accompanist Anna Laura Kidder saw his potential and became his benefactor.

Jester Hairston was one of the first black students admitted to Tufts.

Jester Hairston pledged the Chi chapter of the Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity in 1925.

Jester Hairston worked as a choir conductor in the early stages of his career.

Jester Hairston sang with the Hall Johnson Choir in Harlem for a time but was nearly fired from the all-black choir because he had difficulty with the rural dialects that were used in some of the songs.

Jester Hairston had to shed his Boston accent and relearn the country speech of his parents and grandparents.

Russian composer Dimitri Tiomkin heard Jester Hairston and invited him to what would become a 30-year collaboration in which Jester Hairston arranged and collected music for films.

Jester Hairston wrote and arranged spirituals for Hollywood films as well as for high school and college choirs around the country.

Jester Hairston arranged the song "Amen", which he dubbed for the Sidney Poitier film Lilies of the Field, and arranged traditional Negro spirituals.

Jester Hairston acted in more than 20 films, mostly in small roles, some uncredited.

Jester Hairston starred in John Wayne's The Alamo, in which he portrayed "Jethro", a slave owned by Jim Bowie.

In 1962's To Kill a Mockingbird Jester Hairston portrayed the uncredited role of the father of accused rapist Tom Robinson.

In 1967's In the Heat of the Night, Jester Hairston portrayed the butler of a wealthy racist being investigated for murder.

In both films, Jester Hairston shot scenes alongside men who won an Academy Award for Best Actor in those respective films for portraying white Southerners navigating their jobs through a racially divided culture.

Jester Hairston traveled all over the world teaching and performing the folk music of the slaves.

Jester Hairston was the recipient of many honorary doctorates, including a doctorate from the University of Massachusetts in 1972 and a doctorate in music from Tufts in 1977.

Jester Hairston appeared on the television situation comedy The Amos 'n' Andy Show as society sophisticate Henry Van Porter and portrayed the character of Leroy on both the radio and television Amos 'n' Andy programs.

Jester Hairston played the role of Wildcat on the show That's My Mama.

Jester Hairston played the role of "King Moses" on radio for the Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall show Bold Venture.

Jester Hairston died in Los Angeles of natural causes in 2000 at age 98.

Jester Hairston is interred at Inglewood Park Cemetery, Inglewood, California.