Entertainer. She broke through racial barriers as the first black performer to sign a long-term contract with a major Hollywood studio. Born Lena Mary Calhoun Horne, her grandparents were active in the NAACP and she was a cover girl for the organization's monthly bulletin at the age of two. Not long after her parents divorced, she was left in the care of her grandparents while her mother, a stage actress, pursued her career. By age seven, her mother had reclaimed her, and, at age 16, Lena (who attended Girls High School in Brooklyn and took dance lessons while there) dropped out of school to join the chorus at the Cotton Club in Harlem. She achieved stardom on the nightclub circuit as a singer of blues and ballads, enhanced by her radiant beauty, vibrant voice, and charismatic qualities. Broadway opportunities were found, and she made her stage debut in the short-lived 1934 play "Dance With Your Gods," followed by "Lew Leslie's Blackbirds of 1939" (1939). In 1938, she made her silver screen debut in the picture "The Duke Is Tops" and signed with MGM during the early 1940s. She displayed her vocal talents in the motion pictures "Cabin in the Sky" (1943), "Stormy Weather" (1943), "Thousands Cheer" (1943), "Two Girls and a Sailor" (1944), "Ziegfeld Follies" (1945), "Till the Clouds Roll By" (1946), and "Words and Music" (1948). During this period, her marriage to Louis Jones (whom she married at age 19 and had a daughter and son) had ended. In 1947, she married musician Lennie Hayton. Their interracial marriage would be kept a secret for three years due to the likelihood of a backlash. During the 1950s and 1960s, she performed on numerous TV programs, including "Your Show of Shows," "The Ed Sullivan Show," and "The Judy Garland Show." She returned to the Broadway stage in "Jamaica" (1957 to 1959). She scored a top-20 hit with "Love Me or Leave Me," which peaked at 19 on the Pop charts in 1955, and recorded the highly-successful album "Lena Horne at the Waldorf Astoria" (1957), becoming one of the top female artists in the history of RCA Records. In 1969, after a lengthy hiatus from the big screen, she returned with her first dramatic role opposite Richard Widmark in "Death of a Gunfighter." During a short time span from 1970 to 1971, she suffered personal tragedies with the deaths of her father, husband, and son, causing her for a period to go into a state of depression. In 1978, she appeared in the film "The Wiz," and won a special Tony Award for her performances in the Broadway production "Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music" in 1981. Throughout her career, she was a passionate advocate for civil rights. She was honored for Lifetime Achievement at the Kennedy Center in 1984, was recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award in 1989, and a NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Jazz Artist in 1999. She received two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for music, the other for film.