Hattie McDaniel’s ‘Gone With The Wind’ Oscar To Be Replaced At Howard University
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Academy Museum recently announced that it would replace Hattie McDaniel’s historic Oscar award 50 years after its disappearance.
In 1940, the acting pioneer earned a plaque for “Best Supporting Actress” for her role as Mammy in “Gone with the Wind,” making her the first Black person to be nominated and win the prestigious award. At the time, it was customary for supporting performance winners to receive a plaque instead of a statuette.
The plaque will be given to Howard University’s Chadwick A. Boseman College of Fine Arts during a “Hattie’s Come Home” ceremony at the college’s Ira Aldridge Theater in Washington D.C. on Oct. 1.
When McDaniel won her prize, she could not sit with the film’s other nominee because of the era’s racist policies. Before she died in 1952 from breast cancer, the comedian requested that her award be donated to the historically Black university.
