I know the most terrible thing that can happen to a woman. That is the gang-up. Men put you to sleep with their drops and one man after another goes in and takes you.

I was born out of wedlock. Nobody brought me up.

Negroes are human beings with exactly the same faults and virtues as members of the other races.

My whole family could sing. My family harmonized without any instruments to accompany them.

There had been lots of crises in my life. And there was plenty of spunk and battle cry still left in me.

I never posed as a saint. I would have slept with a man for nothing if I liked him well enough.

New York is only 97 miles from Philadelphia but was the Big Time as no other American city has ever been.