Celebrating Women's History Month: Philippa Schuyler

Philippa Schuyler

This week for women’s history month, we’re honoring Philippa Schuyler, a highly intelligent and incredibly talented pianist, writer, and political activist who began her career as a young child and whose life came to an early, tragic end. 

Philippa Duke Schuyler was born in New York City in the Sugar Hill section of Harlem in 1931 to a black father and white mother and they lived on Convent Avenue. Her father, George S. Schuyler was a conservative author and journalist writing for a prominent newspaper called the Pittsburgh Courier and often took a strong stance against racism in his writings. Philippa’s mother Josephine Cogdell, was a wealthy woman from Texas and descendant of a slave-owning family. 

The couple married in order to defy racism in America and raise mixed-race children who they believed would grow up to be extraordinary. Like most American mothers, Cogdell wanted the best for Philippa and believed that feeding her raw foods like carrots, peas, steak, and liver would help her daughter become smart and successful. This seemed to work in her favor as Philippa began walking and talking before she reached her first birthday. By the age of two, she was able to read and write and by the age of four had an IQ of 185 and was flawlessly performing on the piano, quite often being compared to Mozart. 

Due to her father’s connections, young Philippa’s photo soon began appearing in prominent magazines including Time, Look, the New York Herald Tribune, and The New Yorker. Around this time, Philippa’s parents entered her in musical competitions where she received high praise and caught the attention of New York City mayor Fiorello LaGuardia who was so impressed by her that he declared June 19, 1940 “Philippa Duke Schuyler Day,” and she played as LaGuardia’s guest of honor at the New York World Fair. By this time, Philippa had more than 100 musical compositions under her belt and was a member of the American Society of Composers.

All of this however, was very hard for young Philippa and she often felt as though she were being used as an experiment by her parents to see how successful she can actually become. Indeed, her mother was the most determined to prove to her family and also to the rest of the America how important it is for whites and Negros to come together. Josephine’s family were appalled by her choices and were so adamantly against the idea of an interracial marriage that they refused to attend little Philippa’s concerts. Philippa received very little (if any) kind of nurturing in the form of hugs or kisses during her childhood and endured regular beatings from her mother as a form of discipline.

By the time Philippa reached her teen years, her life became increasingly stressful as there was more pressure from her parents and also had to put up with racial discrimination. 

When she was 13, her parents presented her with a scrapbook that included photographs from her childhood and school report cards that Philippa was repulsed by.  Despite this turmoil, Philippa continued to be successful during her teen years performing a piece she wrote called Manhattan Nocturne at the New York Philharmonic to an audience of 12,000 in April 1945 establishing herself as a composer, with her photo continuing to appear in magazines. She attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart High School in New York City and in her spare time, educated herself further reading books like Madame Bovary and The Quran. After graduation, she wrote and performed Rhapsody of Youth during the inauguration of Haitian president Paul Magloire in 1950 and delivered a highly praised performance for Queen Elisabeth of Belgium in 1959. 

Philippa’s adult life was a different story as her race continued to be an issue and she began having less success in the United States as white audiences were diminishing and she began touring overseas visiting Europe, Central America, South America, Africa, and Asia hitting 80 countries over a 15-year period and became fluent in six languages. Audiences in these countries were more accepting of Philippa as an American artist but the fact that Philippa was mulatto was still an issue in her own country and in an attempt to move away from her black heritage declared “I am not a Negro!” and assumed a new identity as a Spanish woman by the name of Felipa Monterro y Schuyler.

Nevertheless, Philippa was disgusted by the gender and racial prejudice taking place that she abandoned her career in music by age 30, and pursued a career in journalism following her father’s footsteps. She started out as a political reporter for United Press International reporting from the Belgian Congo in 1960 when they achieved independence, thus becoming the Republic of Congo. A year later, she began developing staunchly conservative political views writing for the ultraconservative New Hampshire newspaper, Manchester Union Leader and, along with her father, joined the John Birch Society, a right-wing advocacy group. Philippa also wrote several non-fiction books and magazine articles around this time.

Philippa’s assignments for the Manchester Union Leader kept her busy as a world traveler often visiting Vietnam to do missionary work and she even founded an organization to help rescue orphans and displaced residents there as the war progressed. One of these evacuation missions took place on May 9, 1967, while Philippa and her organization were headed to Da Nang when the helicopter crashed into the sea. Philippa’s inability to swim caused her to drown at age 35.

Philippa Schuyler’s short life was undoubtedly tumultuous but not wasted. Her extraordinary talents and accomplishments have made her a role model for aspiring, young musicians who can achieve anything with hard work despite major hardships, and in her later life, she came to the aid of many refugees in parts of the world ravaged by war.