Harry Belafonte Dies: Activist and Performer Was 96

Actor, singer and civil rights icon Harry Belafonte has died. He was 96.

The New York Times reports that Belafonte died Tuesday at home on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. His spokesperson, Ken Sunshine, told the outlet Belafonte died of congestive heart failure.

Belafonte, who was known as the “King of Calypso” for his hits like “The Banana Boat Song (Day-O),” first found success in music before expanding to acting and later, activism.

He was born Harold George Bellanfanti Jr. March 1, 1927, in Harlem. Belafonte and his mother and brother moved to Jamaica in 1936 before returning to Harlem four years later, in 1940, per the Times.

Belafonte dropped out of high school and enlisted in the Navy in 1944, and later enrolled at at Erwin Piscator’s Dramatic Workshop after being discharged and returning to New York. While taking classes there, he also performed at nightclubs and earned his first recording contract in 1949, per CNN.

In the years following, Belafonte won a Tony Award for best featured actor in a musical and appeared in films like Island in the Sun; The World, the Flesh and the Devil; and Odds Against Tomorrow. His more recent filmography includes BlacKkKlansman and Bobby.

In the ’60s, Belafonte took a step back from Hollywood and shifted his focus to activism, working with Martin Luther King Jr. and becoming a key figure in the civil rights movement. Belafonte took out a life insurance policy on King that helped support his family after his assassination.

“Whenever we got into trouble or when tragedy struck, Harry has always come to our aid, his generous heart wide open,” Coretta Scott King said in her memoir, per CNN.

Belafonte continued his activism throughout the decades, organizing the “We Are the World” charity record for African famine relief and releasing a 1988 album in protest of apartheid, per The Guardian. Belafonte was also a Unicef goodwill ambassador and an AIDS activist, as well as an advocate for prostate cancer awareness after his own battle with the disease.

Throughout his career, he was award the Kennedy Center Honor in 1989, the National Medal of Arts in 1994 and the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2000. 

Belafonte was married to Marguerite Byrd from 1948 to 1957 and shares daughters Adrienne and Shari with her. He later wed and divorced Julie Robinson, with whom he shares children Gina and David. He is survived by his third wife, Pamela Frank.