Personal Life
Tyson was born and raised in Harlem, New York, the daughter of Theodosia, a domestic, and William Tyson, who worked as a carpenter, a painter, or any other jobs he could find. Her parents were immigrants from the island of Nevis of the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis in the West Indies; Her father arrived in New York City at the age of 21 and was processed at Ellis Island on August 4, 1919.
Tyson married legendary jazz trumpeter Miles Davis on November 26, 1981. The ceremony was conducted by Atlanta mayor Andrew Young at the home of actor Bill Cosby. Tyson and Davis divorced in 1988.
She is a member of Delta Sigma Theta sorority. On May 17, 2009, Tyson received an honorary degree from Morehouse College, an all-male college.
In 2010, she was awarded the Spingarn Medal from the NAACP.
Read more about this topic: Cicely Tyson
Famous quotes containing the words personal and/or life:
“We should stop looking to law to provide the final answer.... Law cannot save us from ourselves.... We have to go out and try to accomplish our goals and resolve disagreements by doing what we think is right. That energy and resourcefulness, not millions of legal cubicles, is what was great about America. Let judgment and personal conviction be important again.”
—Philip K. Howard, U.S. lawyer. The Death of Common Sense: How Law Is Suffocating America, pp. 186-87, Random House (1994)
“One might feel that, at my age, I should look on life with more gravity. After all, I’ve been privileged to listen, firsthand, to some of the most profound thinkers of my day ... who were all beset by gloom over the condition the world had gotten into. Then why can’t I view it with anything but amusement?”
—Anita Loos (1894–1981)