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“’The world’s most glamorous atmosphere. Why, it was just like the Arabian nights!’ said a young Duke Ellington when he first saw Harlem in 1923.” (George Hoefer, album notes to Columbia C3L-33, “Jazz Odyssey Volume III, The Sound of Harlem.”)
1.) Unknown address, presumably in Harlem (February-March 1923).
Per Sonny Greer, interview with Stanley Crouch (p. 16 of JOHP transcript, quoted by Nicholson, p. 28): "We come to New York, so me and Duke had a room together. I had an aunt in New York, got a room. I think I was giving her $3.00 a week." Sonny doesn't mention the name of his aunt or the address of her apartment, but does tell us the gig at the Lafayette with Sweatman soon followed, which dates this event.
2.) 50 W. 129th Street, Harlem (summer 1923).
Per Duke Ellington (MIMM, p. xi): "The road leads on to New York City […] to Forny Brooks's' flat on 129th Street. Forny and his wife said, 'We like the way you kids play. You can stay here as long as you want. Don't worry about the rent. You can pay when you get it because we think you kids are really going somewhere.’ Per Duke Ellington, "Jazz as I Have Seen It, Part IV" (June 1940, p. 11): "We were living with some nice people and they told us we could stay on until we found some work. We kept right on auditioning, but nothing ever happened. There was no work. Then Brick-Top came along, and she saved the day for us. I'd worked with Brick-Top of Montmartre, Paris, at the Oriental in Washington. 'Barrons' was a very popular spot and she knew Barron well. She got him to let his band go and hire us instead. We'd scuffed for five weeks, and here at last we were to go to work." Ellington's stay with Forny Brooks began in the summer of 1923. The full address is noted on Ellington’s “Postal Savings System” account book (Ruth Ellington Collection, NMAH), which documents transactions on 18 dates from August 1, 1923, the day the account was established, to January 8, 1925.
3.) 2067 Seventh Avenue, Harlem (circa 1923 to 1925 or 1926).
While working at Barron's in the summer of 1923, Ellington met Leonard Harper, who soon rented rooms in his apartment at 2067 Seventh Avenue to Ellington and Hardwick. Ellington’s Postal Savings System account book shows the 129th Street address crossed out and the Seventh Avenue address written above it. Mercer Ellington (DEIP, p. 17) recalled staying with his parents at 2067 Seventh Avenue “it must have been 1924 the first time I went there.” The June 1, 1925 New York State census enumerated Leonard (“head of household”) and Arsecola [recte Osceola] Harper (“wife”) and “lodgers” Edward and Edna Ellington, Otto and Gladys Hardwick, and Harry Duckett (an actor), all living in an apartment at 2067 Seventh Avenue. This same census listed Fred Guy and Edward Ellington as “lodgers” at 137 127th Street. Why the census takers enumerated Ellington at two different addresses is a mystery.
4.) 135 W. 142nd Street, Apt. 3, Harlem (1925 or 1926 to 1927).
According to the 1925 New York State census, this was the address of Dewey Jeffries (mother) and LeRoy Jeffries (son). Ellington (MIMM, p. xi) lists his various New York addresses, “Leroy Jeffries’ mother’s flat on 142nd Street” is mentioned first, “Forny Brooks’s flat on 129th Street” second, and “Leonard Harper’s flat on Seventh Avenue” third. Ellington was apparently mistaken on this point, since evidence shows the actual sequence of his moves was Brooks to Harper to Jeffries! The 1926 Local 802 AFM Membership book lists Ellington's address as 135 W. 142nd Street., Apt. 3 (Tel: BRAdhurst 0313). This was likely the apartment where, in September 1927, Edna slashed her husband’s cheek with his knife, leading to their permanent separation.
5.) Unknown address, presumably in Harlem (circa September 1927 to circa 1928).
Mercer Ellington (DEIP, p. 77) recalled that when Ellington left Mildred Dixon in 1938, he “once again left all his clothes behind.” One can only infer that the first time he left all his clothes behind was in 1927, when he left Edna to move someplace else. The possibility that he then stayed with Fred Guy has been suggested, but I’ve found no credible confirmatory evidence.
6.) Unknown address on 141st Street, Harlem (circa 1928).
Barry Ulanov (“Duke Ellington,” p. 114) wrote that “Duke moved in with her [Mildred Dixon] at her 141st Street apartment, shortly after” they met at the Cotton Club where she was employed as an adagio dancer. Ulanov (p. 114 of typescript of unpublished 1989 interview): “Mildred was an odd, little feisty woman whom I liked the best.” Since Barry knew Edna, Mildred and Evie, his opinion was at least educated.
7.) 381 Edgecombe Avenue, Sugar Hill, Harlem (1928 or 1929 to 1938).
Ellington wrote (MIMM, p. xi) that after Leonard Harper's flat, he moved into “my own place at 381 Edgecombe Avenue," which Mercer (DEIP, p. 18) recalled had “three bedrooms, a living room and a kitchen.” The earliest documentation of “Duke Ellington” at 381 (Tel: AUDubon-1712) is a listing in the Manhattan Address Telephone Directory dated May 18th, 1929, and he was also found at 381 in the 1930 Federal census, enumerated 1930 04 12. Fred and Minnie Guy were enumerated in a different apartment in the same building.
8.) Unknown address on St. Nicholas Place, Sugar Hill, Harlem (1938).
Per Mercer Ellington (DEIP, p. 77): "Pop met her [Beatrice “Evie” Ellis] at the Cotton Club [in the spring of 1938] when she was rooming on St. Nicholas Place, and after staying with her briefly off and on, it got to the stage where he lived there all the time. He never came back to 381 Edgecombe Avenue, and once again he left all his clothes behind.”
9.) 409 Edgecombe Avenue, Sugar Hill, Harlem (1938 to circa 1942).
Per Mercer Ellington (DEIP, p. 78): “Ruth and I were left at 381 Edgecombe Avenue with Mil. After he and Mil had come to the parting of the ways, we realized that if we didn't change our residence he would never come back to live with us, or even to visit us, because he didn't want to come back to face Mil. So we left the apartment, left all the furniture and everything with Mil, and moved farther up the street to 409.” Strayhorn’s lyrics to Take the “A” Train incorporated Ellington’s directions to his apartment on Edgecombe Avenue: “You must take the ‘A’ Train, to go to Sugar Hill ‘way up in Harlem.” On his Selective Service registration card, “date of registration 1942 02 16, ”Ellington listed his address as 409 Edgecombe Avenue.
10.) 935 St. Nicholas Avenue, Apt. 4A, Washington Heights (circa 1942 to 1961).
11.) Warwick Hotel, 65 W. 54th Street, Midtown (circa February 1959).
Ellington was staying at the Warwick when he first saw the March 1959 issue of Ebony with its five-page feature on his estranged wife Edna, “A Visit with Mrs. Duke Ellington.” Irving Townsend, his producer at Columbia Records, later recalled (The Atlantic, May 1975, p. 81): “We were in his suite at the Warwick Hotel in New York City one afternoon when his publicist, Joe Morgen, arrived with a copy of one of the now defunct picture magazines [as of 2024, Ebony is still being published in print and digital editions] in which there was a feature article by a reporter who had discovered that Duke's legal wife, from whom he had long been separated, was living in Washington, D.C. Ellington took one look at the caption and the photographs, then stared silently at the traffic on Sixth Avenue. This was a penetration of his privacy. I have never seen him so angry.”
12.) 400 Central Park West, Upper West Side (1961 to circa 1965).
13.) Lincoln Towers, 140 West End Avenue, Apt. 22C, Upper West Side (circa 1965 to 1974).
13 residences are listed above. Addresses aren’t known for four of the buildings. The other nine are extant and all can be viewed via Google Images or Street View in Google Maps.
Historical information on Sugar Hill and its buildings will be found by following these links:
Information on the building at 935 St. Nicholas Avenue is found here:
Thanks to Michael Kilpatrick, David Palmquist, Lewis Porter and Ken Steiner for their assistance