Stax

Moms Mabley (March 19, 1897- May 23, 1975), recorded one album for the Partee subsidiary of Stax shortly before her death. Her long and successful career as a professional comedian included decades as a traveling performer, and many gold records for other companies. In September 1972, Mabley recorded an album of newly written material for Stax, I Like ‘Em Young. Mabley was active member of the Democratic Party and the NAACP. In a 1972 interview with the Memphis Press-Scimitar Mabley spoke out against the war in Vietnam. “I’ve shed many a tear over those boys [fighting in Vietnam]. I wanted to go over there... but the government said I was too old.... But if I’d gone over there I’d have said, ‘come on children, let’s go home.’” Mabley, and fellow African-American comedians Steppin Fetchit and Slappy White, were presented keys to the city of Memphis by Rev. James Netters in a July 1974 ceremony. Fetchit wheeled Mabley off of their airplane in a wheelchair, and the two were greeted with a throng of young well-wishers. She had recently had a pacemaker installed to help her ailing heart. She died less than a year later, May 23, 1975 in a hospital in New York.