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Octavus Roy Cohen

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Octavus Roy Cohen
Born(1891-06-26)June 26, 1891
Charleston, South Carolina, U.S.
DiedJanuary 6, 1959(1959-01-06) (aged 67)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Resting placeForest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale, California, U.S.
Occupation
  • Writer
  • actor
Alma materClemson College
Spouse
Inez Lopez
​
​
(m. 1914; died 1953)​
Children1

Octavus Roy Cohen (1891–1959) was an early 20th century American author specializing in ethnic comedies.

Biography

Early life

He was a descendant of Portuguese Jews.[citation needed] He was born on June 26, 1891 in Charleston, South Carolina to Octavus and Rebecca Cohen (née Ottolengui).[1] He pronounced his first name oc-tav'us, a as in have.[2]

He received his secondary education at the Porter Military Academy, now the Porter-Gaud School, and graduated in 1908. He went on to Clemson College (later renamed Clemson University) and graduated in 1911 with a degree in engineering.[1][3]

Career

Between 1910 and 1912, he worked in the editorial departments of the Birmingham Ledger, the Charleston News and Courier, the Bayonne Times, and the Newark Morning Star.[1] He became popular as a result of his stories printed in The Saturday Evening Post which were about African-Americans.[4] In 1913, he was admitted to the South Carolina bar and practiced law in Charleston for two years.[1] Between 1917 and his death, he published 56 books, works that included humorous and detective novels, plays, and collections of short stories.[citation needed] He also composed successful Broadway plays and radio, film, and television scripts.

As a mark of his success, on March 20, 1923, Cohen bought in Birmingham, Alabama the "Redin-Cohen" house, a Tudor Revival style home.[5][6][citation needed] He was known to host local writers and journalists to discuss fiction writing while in Birmingham.[3] The Redin-Cohen house was built circa 1918 by Mrs. Viola Roden Redin, one of five daughters of the leading saloon operator in Birmingham on the northern half of lots 1 and 2 in block 864 based on the City of Birmingham plan and survey by Elyton Land Company. The Cohens occupied the house until May 7, 1937, a time period covering some of Cohen's major work.[citation needed]

He moved from Birmingham to Harlem, New York in the late 1930s and thereafter to Los Angeles to pursue a film career.

Personal life and death

He married Inez Lopez in October 1914 in Bessemer, Alabama.[3] Together, they had one son, Octavus Roy Cohen Jr.

His wife died in 1953. He died of a stroke on January 6, 1959 in Los Angeles. He is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.[3]

Works

His most notable creation was "Florian Slappey", a fictional black detective who appeared both in print (in the Saturday Evening Post) and in a series of short films in the 1920s,[7] These were "ethnic comedies" following the bumbling investigations of Slappey and his travels from Birmingham, Alabama to Harlem, New York. These were later assembled into a stage play "Come Seven". A second stage detective play "The Crimson Alibi" featured a white detective, David Carroll.[8]

He wrote:

  • Polished Ebony (1919)
  • Gray Dusk (1920)
  • Come Seven (1920)
  • Highly Colored (1921)
  • Midnight (1922)
Installment of the short-lived comic strip Tempus Todd, the first comic strip in a mainstream newspaper to portray black characters as real people. Here, Tempus and a bakery owner talk about advertising.

Cohen wrote several novels about detective David Carroll. One of these novels, The Crimson Alibi was adapted for the stage by George Broadhurst.[9] Cohen's character of Jim Hanvey, "a sort of backwoods Nero Wolfe", "one of the earliest private eyes",[10] appeared in two films; Curtain at Eight (1933), based on his novel The Backstage Mystery, and Jim Hanvey, Detective (1937), based on his original story. "Hanvey made most of his appearances in short stories in The Saturday Evening Post, where much of ... Cohen's other work was also published. ... Cohen created a few other detectives ... one of the first black eyes, Florian Slappey, although they're more famous now for their unflattering portrayal of blacks than their historical significance."[10]

Jim Hanvey books by Cohen:[11]

  • Jim Hanvey, Detective (1923, short stories)
  • Detours (1927, short stories, one featuring Hanvey)
  • The May Day Mystery (1929)
  • The Backstage Mystery (also published as Curtain at Eight) (1930)
  • Star of Earth (1932)
  • Scrambled Yeggs (1934, short stories)

Films

Cohen was scriptwriter (or co-scriptwriter with Alfred A. Cohen) for six known films:[13]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Marquis, Albert Nelson; Leonard, John William, eds. (1920). Who's who in America. Vol. 11. p. 582.
  2. ^ Charles Earle Funk, What's the Name, Please?, Funk & Wagnalls, 1936
  3. ^ a b c d Wright, A.J. "Octavus Roy Cohen". encyclopediaofalabama.org. Retrieved March 9, 2021.
  4. ^ Honey, Maureen. “Images of Women in the Saturday Evening Post, 1931–1936,”.Journal of Popular Culture; Bowling Green, Ohio Vol. 10, Iss. 2, (Fall 1976): (p.352)
  5. ^ "Markers". Jefferson County Historical Commission. Retrieved March 9, 2021.
  6. ^ Jefferson County Historical Commission (Vol.1237, p.104)
  7. ^ Blacks in Films, Jim Pines ISBN 0 289 70326 3
  8. ^ http://www.thrillingdetective.com/slappey.html
  9. ^ Bordman Gerald, American Theatre: A Chronicle of Comedy and Drama 1914-1930.Oxford University Press USA, 1995 ISBN 0195090780 (p.106).
  10. ^ a b "Jim Hanvey". www.thrillingdetective.com.
  11. ^ Crime Fiction, 1749-1980: A Comprehensive Bibliography by Allen J. Hubin, Garland, 1984, ISBN 0-8240-9219-8
  12. ^ "Exhibitors Herald World". Quigley Publishing Company. April 5, 1930 – via Google Books.
  13. ^ http://www.thrillingdetective.com/slappey.html

Media related to Octavus Roy Cohen at Wikimedia Commons

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