A glorious contralto voice, nurtured in the choir of the Union Baptist Church , brought recognition in Europe to the young Marian Anderson. As a black woman in the United States , however, she was almost a life-long victim of racism. In the late 1930's she was denied access to Washington's Constitution Hall by its owners, the Daughters of the American Revolution, in one of the most dramatic events in the history of the arts in this country. Vindication came in the form of an invitation from Eleanor Roosevelt to sing at the Lincoln Memorial on Easter Sunday 1939 to an audience of 75,000, followed shortly thereafter by a performance honoring Great Britain's King George VI and Queen Elizabeth. Marian Anderson was later named a delegate to the United Nations and was the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Medal of Honor from President Carter.

Her entry into the hallowed realm of the Metropolitan Opera signaled the beginning of a new era for other black artists. A long-time resident of Marianna Farm in Danbury , Marion Anderson was the author of an autobiography, “My Lord What a Morning.”