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Age Controversy

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Blake's WWII draft registration card lists his birthdate as 1883, so at the very least, the statement that all government documents indicate the 1887 date is incorrect.

The following documents do list the 1887 date:

  • Social Security Death Index (SSN 113-05-1371)
  • 1920 Census (lists age as 33)

cbustapeck 17:25, 12 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Don't forget the 1900 census which is linked to in this article. It clearly shows 1887. And as he would have been either 4 or 8 years old depending on who you believe, he (or rather his parents) would have had no reason to lie about it. If anything makes the definitive case for 1887, it's that document. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.93.88.198 (talk) 04:48, 3 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I believe the 1887 date is wrong too. How could he have met his wife in primary school if he was 8 and she was 14? His wife's birthdate is listed as 1881. 1883 would certainly be more plausable. It would have made him 16 when he composed Charleston Rag which is more believable. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 216.227.9.187 (talk) 15:27, 18 January 2007 (UTC).[reply]
An anon IP editor today attempted to add this article from The New York Times, which gives a year of 1883. I reverted as the edit was not formatted correctly. Any thoughts? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:38, 5 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

12 Year Old Composer??? He must have been 1883-1983

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Supposedly Eubie Blake, born in February of 1887 composed the Charleston Rag in 1899 -- now really ... 16 is plausible, but 12??? Come on.

Ever heard of Mozart? Come on.
List of music prodigies#Composition and Conducting for even more examples.--T. Anthony 16:52, 12 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Good, very, very good point. But he might have changed that later on, he simpy tried to avoid comabt in war. I was told, he was younger, and only a certain age limit is allowed to enter the army.
Keep in mind. Mozart was total prodigy and back then they did not publish notes or rolls. Remember, Maple Leaf Rag was PUBLISHED in 1899 and many more in the next subsequent years.

It's possible he was 96 or even 100, but because of army service, 1887 stayed, including on his social seucirty. He must have been 100 when he died.
And Since the Social Security Board did not have a network of field offices in late 1936,(by then he had personal reasons to change age, many people do) it contracted with the U.S. Postal Service to distribute and assign the first batch of Social Security numbers through its 45,000 local post offices around the country. Of these 45,000 post offices, 1,074 were also designated as "typing centers" where the cards themselves were prepared. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 64.107.1.199 (talk) 17:56, 2 July 2007 (UTC).[reply]
your primer on the us ssa is all very fascinating information i'm sure. however, there 'must' be some final arbiter on the subject of an official date of birth, and it seems to me that when every official document on the planet points to a birth year of 1887....well...who better than the ssa? further, i am removing the inline-link again because: 1) the loc is not the arbiter determining birth year, 2) the link clarifies nothing, and 3) the article itself devotes a good thirty percent to the subject which completely addresses the subject. cheers. --emerson7 | Talk 18:44, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Why 'must' there be a document that will settle this debate? Until relatively recently it was quite possible for a person to successfully obscure his date of birth, or in some cases to not even know it with certainty. It seems to me that the only document that should really be considered more relevant than any other is a birth certificate, but from the way this debate is going I assume none available. Another idea that occurs to me is to look at media coverage of Blake's later years and death. Retrospectives about him from 1977-1983 or so might mention his approaching 100th birthday, and most likely his age or date of birth in any case. Presumably, anything published about him at that time would have his approval and should probably just be taken as authoritative (while still noting the controversy and unanswered questions, of course). By the same token, all his obituaries taken together have the same implicit approval from his family. Surely some consensus can emerge from these sources. My real reason in adding to this discussion, though, is just to warn you all to be careful about consistency with his date of birth and age as stated in the article and infobox. The infobox currently says "1883-1983 (Aged 96)," which is ridiculous.R0m23 (talk) 23:02, 6 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Of course, the simplest explanation is that Charleston Rag was not composed in 1899. There's no trace of it before the 1917 piano roll as far as I know.
Indeed, he lied about his age; he probably lied about the date of Charleston Rag too. The 1900 census lists Hubert as being 4 years old. Unless you think his parents had some reason in 1900 to lie about their son's age to make him four years younger -- and the census taker being unable to tell the difference between a 4-year-old and an 8-year-old -- the birth year of 1887 should be considered definitively correct. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.93.88.198 (talk) 04:44, 3 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Now, I've just stumbled across all this by looking up Eubie Blake, but I have to wonder - how can the 1900 census listing him as 4 years old support an 1887 birthdate? If he were born in 1887 he should have been 13 in 1900. Not 4. And, in fact, in does list him as 13. http://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/File:1900_census_Blake.gif His entry is near the bottom. The Luizer (talk) 15:16, 30 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Personal info

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There is a section left out. At some point Eubie was living in St. Louis. He used to "hang out" at a little piano bar on Euclid in the Central West End. I spent a lot of time listening to him and admiring that at his age, he was still playing. I believe this was in 1980-81.

I heard Eubie Blake perform at the Nice Jazz Festival in 1978. He was still playing with remarkable vitality. I remember a Rag Time improvision on Wagner's Tannhauser Overture. A true great.Thermosoverfil (talk) 01:08, 28 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In mentioning the production of "Eubie!" on Broadway in 1978, the article mistakenly states this: "The production won the Tony Award for Best Musical in 1979." Actually, "Sweeney Todd" won in 1979 and "Eubie!" was not even nominated for Best Musical (according to Wikipedia's own page on the "33rd Tony Awards"). I suggest deleting the sentence and either not mentioning the Tony Awards or replacing it with: The production was nominated for three Tony Awards but did not win any. GreggJazz (talk) 04:08, 1 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

If I'd known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.

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This quotation should probably be sourced. "If I'd known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself." It is popularly attributed to Mickey Mantle, and WP:RS is important. SaltyBoatr get wet 16:30, 15 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Done! He said it, but almost certainly wasn't the first... EddieHugh (talk) 00:42, 18 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

In mentioning the production of "Eubie!" on Broadway in 1978, the article mistakenly states this: "The production won the Tony Award for Best Musical in 1979." Actually, "Sweeney Todd" won in 1979 and "Eubie!" was not even nominated for Best Musical (according to Wikipedia's own page on the "33rd Tony Awards"). I suggest deleting the sentence and either not mentioning the Tony Awards or replacing it with: The production was nominated for three Tony Awards but did not win any. GreggJazz (talk) 04:01, 1 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

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Blake's Correct Birth Year - 1883 - is Provided by Blake Himself on "The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson"

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In an interview on "The Tonight Show," aired on 2/20/79, Johnny Carson asks a very lucid Eubie Blake if his birthday was "this month?" Blake replies: "Yeah. 7th day of February. I'm 96 years old now." Carson then asks where he was born. Blake replied: "I was born in Baltimore, Maryland. 1883." I know we generally get nervous about including YouTube content - but this appears pretty definitive. The exchange starts at 3:12 and goes until 3:34. On this basis, as well as the documents discussed in the sections above, I'm going to change the birth year given in the article. X4n6 (talk) 10:15, 4 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Read the information in the Birth date section of the article. People lie or don't actually know their birth date, so Blake (or anyone commenting on their own age) is not a good source. That's why independent documents are used instead, where available. If a consensus on this page leads to 1883 being settled on, then fine, change the dates. But don't delete two "DO NOT change w/o consensus" warnings in the article without... consensus. EddieHugh (talk) 22:46, 4 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Your argument would make sense and be reasonable IF there were no other RS to support the claim. His NYT obit correctly states his birthday. Another article days before in the NYT, also states that he was celebrating his 100th birthday and even notes that:

    When he went to the White House in October 1981, to receive the Medal of Freedom from the President, Mr. Reagan mentioned in his presentation that Mr. Blake was 98 years old. Mr. Blake was quick to insist on a more precise count. Ninety-eight and a half, Mr. President, he interjected.

    Additionally, in honor of his 100th birthday, per the NYT article, a concert was held. Also at least two documentaries were produced after his death noting that he lived to be 100. Here's one, actually called "Eubie at 100." If you'd like, I also found another definitive source. The Library of Congress website in the notes on it's: "KENNEDY CENTER TONIGHT series Ep: EUBIE BLAKE - A CENTURY OF MUSIC" page:

    - Eubie Blake attending his 100th birthday celebration at the Kennedy Center, Washington, DC, with Cab Calloway, Rosemary Clooney and Joe Williams, vocal.

So consensus is fine. But as you should know, the preponderance of reliable sources, per WP:RS, are ultimately the only standard which matters on this forum. It seems like a pretty arrogant position for Wikipedia editors to call someone a liar about their own birthdate - especially when abundant sources and the most reliable sources - from the NYT to the White House - all support the exact same date. So do not revert my correction again without providing sources which could be arguably presented as more definitive that the subject himself; or the newspapers of record; or the White House, which would have definitive access to his government birth records; or the Library of Congress! Or, at minimum, unless you also have sources which say Blake was famous for misstating, or not knowing, his own birthday. I'll be more than happy to engage with you and other editors then, and even self-revert, if you provide superior sources. But until then, the burden of proof will be on the quality of those sources versus the quality of the ones which support the correction. X4n6 (talk) 01:25, 5 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The burden of proof is on the editor who wants to change a long-held position. That's you in this instance. All of the sources you cite are from around the time of his death. If an encyclopedia were being written around then, the dob would be given as 1883, because that's what the sources from that time said. (There is no known birth certificate.) The revelations about the government documents all showing 1887 didn't emerge until after 2000. Look at what caused the fuss about Blake's dob, from 2003 on. The summary is that the evidence for 1883 is: what Blake said (and anything based on what Blake said – WH, NYT, LoC, et al.). The evidence for 1887 is: the 1900 census; the 1910 census; the social security death index; his WW I draft card; ie all official documents from before (or based on official documents from before) he became very well known. Resources that have incorporated this update, and explicitly mention the controversy, include (after a quick search): this and this; I haven't found a source that mentions the controversy and chooses 1883. (& the organization that holds his correspondence, manuscripts, etc., donated by his estate, gives 1887, here.) (& you can see here that Encyclopedia Britannica made the change to 1887 only in 2010 – click on Article history, then one of the Aug 10, 2010 updates.)
Myths are hard to eliminate... Louis Armstrong deliberately gave a wrong dob; lots of jazz musicians changed theirs by 2 years to reflect what they regarded as 2 years stolen by compulsory military service... but old (and wrong) information, even from good sources, lives on. EddieHugh (talk) 12:13, 5 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Consider these sources:
    • Brooks, Lost sounds: Blacks and the birth of the recording industry, 1890-1919 (2004): "Recent research based on census and Social Security records indicates that contrary to everything he told the public in later years, Blake's actual date of birth may have been Feb. 7, 1887. More research needs to be done on this. See Peter Hanley, 'Eubie Blake: Everybody’s Just Wild about Eubie,' published in 2003 on the Web site http://www.doctorjazz.co.uk/portlater.html#eblake."
    • Waldo, This is ragtime (2009): "Many researchers have been doing fine work on the Internet. 'Perfessor' Bill Edwards, (www.perfessorbill.com), Ted Tjaden (www.ragtimepiano.ca), and Mike Meddings (www.doctorjazz.co.uk) have put up especially useful sites. Researchers posting on these sites have come up with some remarkable government documents, including several discovered by Peter Hanley, that indicate that Eubie Blake was actually four years younger than 100 when he died in 1983."
    • Green, Lotz, Rye, Black Europe (2013): Discusses the social security, census, military, and passport records, and concludes that the correct year is 1887. (Sorry, lost the quotation.)
These are all scholarly sources, and you can see the progression from caution in 2004 (immediately after the first documents were found) to unequivocal conclusion (now -- and BTW the doctorjazz site has added several additional documents over the years, which is why it's now overwhelmingly convincing) that 1887 is correct. I couldn't find any scholarly source since 2004 that gives 1883. I did find plenty of kid's books and pop sources giving 1883, which is why we don't use such sources. This is a textbook example of the need for critical evaluation of sources: when you have old sources that were unaware of new information, and new scholarly sources discussing new information and coming to a reasoned conclusion, you ignore the old sources because they're obsolete.
This is also a textbook example of why we don't use primary sources except in very limited circumstances. Blake either forgot his true birth year (which happens all the time) or was lying (which happens all the time). Most likely (as discussed in one source I found) he began fibbing about his birth year at some point to enhance his status as a pioneer (apparently Jellyroll Morton did the same thing) and after a while kind of convinced himself of the truth of it. The modern secondary sources have seen through all that.
There's no question that the article should report his birth year as 1887 as flat fact. A footnote can explain the confusion. EEng 02:58, 6 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sorry, but I don't find any of the sources you provided to be as conclusive as you believe, while I do appreciate the input of EddieHugh. But Census records from the period are well-known to be problematic. The doctorjazz site itself notes the 1900 and 1910 Census give 1887 as his birth year, but the 1930 Census lists the year as 1889. The records of African-Americans (and whites) during that period were also routinely suspect, as that source also acknowledged. It was also interesting that the site's author took Blake at his word on the number of siblings he claimed had preceded him - but not own birth year claim. The site also notes his draft registration card as proof, but those were routinely falsified for any number of reasons - mostly either to join before the legal age, or avoid service thought any means.
Also the Social Security Death Index itself is often a source of errors. As these sources note, people routinely gave the wrong information to census takes, especially age information, for any number of reasons:
http://theindepthgenealogist.com/five-common-genealogical-mistakes-to-avoid-when-using-census-records/
http://www.genealogyblog.com/?p=18199
Further, there is another problem with Census records that I discovered. Once errors are found in Census records, they still cannot be corrected. Because they are considered "historic records": https://www.census.gov/history/www/faqs/genealogy_faqs/can_inaccurate_information_be_corrected_on_census_records.html
As a result, none of this supports any belief that the older records are superior to the newer ones. To the contrary, it offers more concrete, even conclusive, evidence that the older records are not definitive and nor should they be treated as such.
Once again, if we're going to believe any government sources, I'm much more inclined to believe the Library of Congress, the (Reagan) White House, the New York Times and the subject himself and the vast number of other sources I've come across. Also, even the man's tombstone lists his year of birth as 1883.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/6201608/eubie-blake#view-photo=10782403
Just as I suspect his death certificate would list 1883. It would be interesting to see if that document would be accepted here.
Bottomline: while there is significant evidence to support the 1887 claim, there is also a significant amount of evidence to question that claim and support the 1883 year. So at minimum, I believe, since we all do agree there are multiple, conflicting and credible sources, the article should at least be amended to include both birth years, per MOS:CIRCA. X4n6 (talk) 11:47, 10 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • We're not taking older records (by which you mean older primary records) as superior; we're taking newer (i.e. up-to-date) scholarly secondary sources as superior, which is what we're supposed to do.
  • You're right that an old LOC bio of Blake gives 1883, but they've since seen the light: the LOC catalog gives 1887 [1], as does Berkeley's [2], Harvard's [3], Yale's [4], Princeton's [5], Michigan's [6], Brown's [7], Dartmouth's [8], Chicago's [9], Cornell's [10], Berklee College of Music's [11], NYPL's [12], and MIT's [13]; ditto Archivegrid/worldcat [14]. (Catalogs aren't sources, but you brought it up.)
EEng 19:32, 10 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
You're right, categories are certainly not sources. In fact, it's quite possible they simply regurgitated the date listed on Wikipedia! All the more reason to get this right here. But not only do they not provide their sources, they don't even rely on the sources they catalog. For example, the only source Berkeley provides, is "Eubie Blake" by Al Rose. Problem is, that book lists Blake's birth year as 1883. While the only reference provided by the New York Public Library, (which you also provided), was a sound recording of the "WNYC 99th birthday tribute to Eubie Blake" - which never would/should have occurred, if our article as currently written is correct - since it says he died at 96! Nor do I agree with the interpretation that the LOC had "seen the light," simply because their catalog lists an unsourced date which even their own bio of Blake doesn't support.
Since you give credence to universities, I'll also point out that Blake received several honorary doctorates. You and I both know it's likely that every one of them listed his birth year as 1883. In fact, several universities continue to so: Southern Illinois University] [15], Duke [16], George Mason [17], a Yale University [18] prof reposted on a University of Alabama site and Harvard [19], which - per your reference to college catalogs, lists some of Blake's papers among the holdings in their library.
Also there are still several notable, reliable sources which continue to support the 1883 birth year, including the Smithsonian National Postal Museum [20], NPR [21], Biography.com [22], Encyclopedia.com [23], Broadway World [24], Blackpast.org [25], American Heritage, The Grio [26], PBS [27], the Maryland State Department of Education [28], the National Library of Australia [29], the Amherst Saxophone Quartet, the Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance, Music Theatre International [30], the The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz, Kennedy Center [31], Britannica Kids, Oxford Reference [32], the US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health [33], Oxford Dictionary of Modern Quotations, Playbill [34], Allmusic [35], etc., etc.
We even have an article on The Eighty-Six Years of Eubie Blake, which was released in 1969. Of course, the only way the title is accurate is if Blake was born in 1883. Of course, your likely response is that he named the album. Of course, but that would also mean that he'd have had to have been lying about his age - making himself older than he was - for decades. At least as early as 1969.
But I especially found the comment on Deadline, by Julianne Boyd, the director of the Broadway musical Eubie! - who obviously not only knew Blake, but had also confronted him and others on his birth year - to be particularly useful. She said:

[The show] featured most of the songs from Shuffle Along plus others written by Eubie. We did a birthday party at a Shubert theater (forget which one — they donated it) to celebrate his 100th birthday 5 years later. He was in frail health and died a few days later. Some historians say he was actually born in 1887 (making him 91 when we did Eubie!), not 1883 but he swore (and so did everyone who knew him) that he was born in 1883.

So while the conventional wisdom here, appears to be that those who believe 1887 over 1883, are those with more quality sources or substance supporting their position, that is clearly not the case. In the final analysis, the fact is that both sides must acknowledge the abundant sources and the plausible indictment of sources, on both sides. Once again, it is not our place to conclude that Blake lied about his birth year. Our place is simply to report the available reliable sources. When those sources conflict, we don't take sides. We post both and let the readers decide. That is as far as we should go. That's also what is called for under MOS:CIRCA. So I suggest that's exactly what we do here - then move on. X4n6 (talk) 09:38, 11 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Any source that comes from, or is based on a source that comes from, before the 1887 revelations were published doesn't add anything (unless there's a very old newspaper article or similar from before he became famous; I've looked but not found anything that mentions his age). The quotation is contradicted by information in the original 1887 revelations. The person who re-wrote the Enc. Brit. article is Terry Waldo, who also knew Blake well and believed the 1883 date until he saw the new information. The current footnote could be expanded a little to give more detail on when the 1887 → 1883 change perhaps happened and to state explicitly that (particularly) older sources give 1883, based on what Blake himself said. But 100% certainty is nearly impossible (could I prove with 100% certainty when I was born? Maybe my birth certificate is fake; maybe the person who wrote it made a mistake; maybe I stole someone else's identity...): the current balance of giving 1887 and adding 1883 as a footnote reflects what the up-to-date, informed sources state. EddieHugh (talk) 10:47, 11 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I'm afraid that X4n6's WP:IDHT insistence on referring to sources prior to the appearance of the 1887 evidence, and low-quality sources such as Biography.com and a Broadway producer's reminiscences, plus his conjecture that librarians at major universities might be getting their cataloging information from Wikipedia, make this just one more incident illustrating his complete inability to evaluate sources; I've gone through this with him before. The idea that this is "the US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health" opining on Blake's birthdate (it's actually a one-liner "submitted by Fred Charatan, retired geriatric psychiatrist, Florida" to the British Medical Journal -- in 2001!) is just priceless. I'll see about expanding the note. EEng 14:55, 11 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
I'm afraid your insistence that everyone view the "1887 revelations," i.e. records, as conclusive; and EEng's longstanding and tediously predictable proclivity for misrepresenting opposing positions; is clouding the judgment of you both. The fact that Terry Waldo changed his mind is, frankly immaterial. We don't write articles based upon one person's opinion, even if they're a friend of the subject - just as we clearly don't write articles based upon the information the subject provides about themselves. I've already addressed my issues with those records and provided sources which support the legitimacy of the concerns I expressed. We agree that we don't have 100% certainty. As such, policy requires that we list both years. Once again, our job is merely to publish the reliable sources - and when they conflict - policy requires that we publish the reliable sources. I don't object to an expanded section discussing the conflict. But I do object to posting a single birth year in the lead as though no conflict exists, only to have that contradicted in the article. If we can't agree on that, I'm also fine with an RfC. X4n6 (talk) 07:46, 19 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
There is no conflict among up-to-date high-quality sources. EEng 11:32, 19 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
You've made your opinion clear. As have I. There is zero logic to including the year controversy in the text, complete with its sources, while ignoring it in the lead and infobox. Nor have you ever claimed your sources were definitive. Because you know better. X4n6 (talk) 01:16, 20 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
There is no controversy in the article, merely an explanation. And that's because there's no controversy, just some sources unaware of the modern evidence and others aware of it and discussing it along with the older evidence – and all agreeing that 1877 is the right year. Obliviousness is not controversy. Sorry if I didn't make myself clear before, but these latter sources are indeed definitive from Wikipedia's point of view, because high-quality up-to-date secondary sources trump outdated secondary sources and tertiary sources drawing on them. For example, we don't present continental drift or the bacterial origin of peptic ulcers as controversies, even though you can find plenty of outdated (and at-the-time reliable) sources pointing in other directions. EEng 06:03, 20 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]
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