The first black actor to receive featured billing in Hollywood movies, Stepin Fetchit has passed into the culture as an emblem of the shameful racial stereotyping that reflected early twentieth century America's perception of blacks as servile, lazy, feckless, and stupid. However, throughout the gravy years of his career during the 1930s, this talented actor entertained movie audiences with his skillfully comic portrayals of slow-talking, dim-witted, shuffling slaves and servants, and earned a large, albeit temporary, fortune.

Stepin Fetchit

Born Lincoln Perry in Key West, Florida, on May 30, 1902, he went on the road as an entertainer in medicine shows and vaudeville before arriving in Hollywood in the late 1920s. His stage act with comic Ed Lee was spotted by a talent scout, engaged by Fox studios, and he took his screen name, which turned out ironically appropriate to many of his screen roles, from...