3 (
Thomas Dent, Benjamin Albert Dent, Walter Jesse Dent)
Ernestine Jessie Covington Dent (May 19, 1904 – March 10, 2001) was an American pianist, music educator, and community leader. She was the wife of
Dillard University president
Albert W. Dent, and the mother of poet and activist
Thomas Dent.
Early life and education
Ernestine Jessie Covington was born in
Houston, Texas,[1] the daughter of Benjamin Jesse Covington and Jennie Belle Murphy Covington.[2][3] Her father was a medical doctor; both of her parents were college graduates, and known to be musical. As prominent African-Americans in Houston, the Covingtons hosted house guests including
Marian Anderson and
Booker T. Washington.[4][5]
Covington began studying piano and violin as a little girl, with Madame Corilla Rochon, a neighbor.[6] By the time she was a teenager, she was playing music in a local women's orchestra[7] and at Baptist church services.[8]
Covington graduated at the top of her class from Houston Colored High School, and attended
Oberlin Conservatory of Music as a music student from 1920 to 1924, where she was a charter member of Pi Kappa Lambda honor society.[6][9] After graduating from Oberlin,[10] she pursued further studies on scholarships at the
Juilliard Musical Foundation,[11][12] where she worked with
James Friskin and
Olga Samaroff. Covington was the first African American and the first woman to attend Juilliard.[9] She earned a master's degree in piano at
Oberlin College in 1934, with a thesis on the compositions of
Franz Liszt.[9][13] Dent accomplished this with support from the
Rosenwald Fund.[8][14][9]
Career
Music
Dent played piano in recitals and on radio in the 1920s and 1930s.[15][16] During this time, she performed with opera singer
Florence Cole Talbert. She taught music in Houston and at
Bishop College in
Marshall, Texas, where she chaired the piano department.[8][9] She served on the board of the New Orleans Philharmonic from 1971–1976. Dent played a vital role in the desegregation of orchestra concerts in New Orleans, and she encouraged the increase of classical musicians of color in symphony orchestras and teaching positions.[9] In 1985, she was the first recipient of the Fine Arts Award from the
Amistad Research Center.[6]
Community leadership
Dent retired from performing in 1936, but remained active as a clubwoman, and was a social presence as a university president's wife from 1941 to 1969. As official hostess at Dillard University, she welcomed into her home prominent guests, including
Martin Luther King Jr.,
Duke Ellington,
Thurgood Marshall, and
Eleanor Roosevelt.[17]
Dent was a founding member of the
Flint-Goodridge Hospital Women's Auxiliary[18] as well as the New Orleans chapter of the historically black sorority
Delta Sigma Theta.[19][20][9] She was credited for inspiring the creation of the
Ebony Fashion Fair,[17] a touring event that raised funds for college scholarships and other charities.[6][8]
Personal life and legacy
Ernestine Covington married college president Albert W. Dent in 1931,[21][22] in a "brilliant wedding" in Houston. Composer and
Howard University music professor
Camille Nickerson played the organ at the ceremony, and
Manet Harrison Fowler was a soprano soloist; biologist
Samuel M. Nabrit stood as Dent's
best man.[23] They had three sons. Their eldest son,
Thomas Covington Dent (1932) became a poet and civil rights activist.[24][25][9][26] She was widowed when Albert Dent died in 1984, and she died in 2001, aged 96 years. The Albert and Jessie Covington Dent Papers are archived in the Amistad Research Center.[27][28] There was a Jessie Covington Dent Music Festival in 1998, and there is a Jessie Covington Dent Memorial Scholarship in Music, both at
Dillard University, named in her memory.[6][8]
^
abcdePruitt, Bernadette (2013).
"Ernestine Jessie Covington Dent". The Handbook of Texas Online, Texas State Historical Association (TSHA). Retrieved 2020-02-10.
^Richardson, Joe M. (1996). "Albert W. Dent: A Black New Orleans Hospital and University Administrator". Louisiana History: The Journal of the Louisiana Historical Association. 37 (3): 309–323.
ISSN0024-6816.
JSTOR4233313.