Charles Alston

His father had been born into slavery in 1851 in Pittsboro, North Carolina.

After the Civil War, he gained an education and graduated from St. Augustine's College in Raleigh.

He became a prominent minister and founder of St. Michael's Episcopal Church, with an African-American congregation.

The senior Alston was described as a "race man": an African American who dedicated his skills to the furtherance of the Black race.

Reverend Alston met his wife when she was a student at his school.

Charles was nicknamed "Spinky" by his father, and kept the nickname as an adult.

Charles Henry Alston (November 28, 1907 – April 27, 1977) was an American painter, sculptor, illustrator, muralist and teacher who lived and worked in the New York City neighborhood of Harlem.

Alston was active in the Harlem Renaissance; Alston was the first African-American supervisor for the Works Progress Administration's Federal Art Project.

Alston designed and painted murals at the Harlem Hospital and the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Building.

Charles Henry Alston was born on November 28, 1907, in Charlotte, North Carolina, to Reverend Primus Priss Alston and Anna Elizabeth (Miller) Alston, as the youngest of five children.

Three survived past infancy: Charles, his older sister Rousmaniere and his older brother Wendell.

In 1910, when Charles was three, his father died suddenly of a cerebral hemorrhage.

Locals described his father as the "Booker T. Washington of Charlotte".

In 1913, Anna Alston married Harry Bearden, Romare Bearden's uncle, making Charles and Romare cousins.

The two Bearden families lived across the street from each other; the friendship between Romare and Charles would last a lifetime.

As a child, Alston was inspired by his older brother Wendell's drawings of trains and cars, which the young artist copied.

Alston also played with clay, creating a sculpture of North Carolina.

As an adult he reflected on his memories of sculpting with clay as a child: "I'd get buckets of it and put it through strainers and make things out of it. I think that's the first art experience I remember, making things."

His mother was a skilled embroiderer and took up painting at the age of 75.

His father was also good at drawing, having wooed Alston's mother Anna with small sketches in the medians of letters he wrote her.

In 1915, the Bearden/Alston family moved to New York, as many African-American families did during the Great Migration.

Alston's step-father, Henry Bearden, left before his wife and children in order to get work.

He secured a job overseeing elevator operations and the newsstand staff at the Bretton Hotel in the Upper West Side.

The family lived in Harlem and was considered middle-class.

During the Great Depression, the people of Harlem suffered economically.

The "stoic strength" seen within the community was later expressed in Charles’ fine art.

At Public School 179 in Manhattan, the boy's artistic abilities were recognized and he was asked to draw all of the school posters during his years there.

In 1917, Harry and Anna Bearden had a daughter together, Aida C. Bearden, who would later marry operatic baritone Lawrence Whisonant.

Alston graduated from DeWitt Clinton High School, where he was nominated for academic excellence and was the art editor of the school's magazine, The Magpie.

He was a member of the Arista - National Honor Society and also studied drawing and anatomy at the Saturday school of the National Academy of Art.

In high school he was given his first oil paints and learned about his aunt Bessye Bearden's art salons, which stars like Duke Ellington and Langston Hughes attended.

After graduating in 1925, he attended Columbia University, turning down a scholarship to the Yale School of Fine Arts.

Alston entered the pre-architectural program but lost interest after realizing what difficulties many African-American architects had in the field.

After also taking classes in pre-med, he decided that math, physics and chemistry "was not just my bag", and he entered the fine arts program.

During his time at Columbia, Alston joined Alpha Phi Alpha, worked on the university's Columbia Daily Spectator, and drew cartoons for the school's magazine Jester.

He also explored Harlem restaurants and clubs, where his love for jazz and black music would be fostered.

In 1929, he graduated and received the Arthur Wesley Dow fellowship to study at Teachers College, where he obtained his Master's in 1931.

For the years 1942 and 1943 Alston was stationed in the army at Fort Huachuca in Arizona.

While working on a mural project at Harlem Hospital, he met Myra Adele Logan, then an surgical intern at the hospital.

In 1990, Alston's bust of Martin Luther King Jr. became the first image of an African American displayed at the White House.