Rex Ingram

Ingram used his best-known role to push against Hollywood's stereotypes, a Gale biography says. Beyond De Lawd, it lists him as Jim in Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in 1939, the Genie in The Thief of Bagdad in 1940, a Sudanese soldier in Sahara, and Christophe in the Federal Theatre Project's Haiti. Critic Donald Bogle, it reports, saw him as an actor who refused to be demeaned by a role. The same source ties his career to Black audiences' sense of pride in an industry that gave few such parts.

What the plaque says

Rex Ingram Dean of American black actors. A Corsicana native, Rex (Clifford) Ingram was the son of Mack and Mamie Ingram. He graduated from Northwestern University before launching his brilliant acting career, which spanned 50 years. Ingram made his screen debut during the era of silent movies in a 1918 "Tarzan" film. He won widespread acclaim for his famous portrayal of "De Lawd" in the 1936 film "Green Pastures." Ingram also appeared on the Broadway stage and in several television productions, bringing his skill and dignity to every performance. He died and was buried in California. (1976)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Petroleum Industry Park — 0.8 mi
  The pipes and drilling tower mark where a city water well struck oil on June 9, 1894, the start of the first Texas field to produce oil and gas in important quantities.
• Blind Lemon Memorial Cemetery — 21 mi
  The Freestone County grave of the Texas blues singer Blind Lemon Jefferson, who recorded for Paramount in Chicago from 1926 and died there in December 1929.
• Ellis County Courthouse — 30 mi
  J. Riely Gordon's courthouse of 1897 in Pecos red sandstone and pink granite, with twenty-one carved stone faces and two cornerstones left by a quarrel over its building.

More markers nearby

• Former Site of Fred Douglass - G.W. Jackson School — steps away
• First Independent Baptist Church of Corsicana — 0.2 mi
• American Well & Prospecting Company — 0.3 mi
• Corsicana Newspapers — 0.4 mi