Philippa Duke Schuyler was born on August 2 1931 in New York, NY. She was an American concert pianist and writer. She was the only child of the most celebrated interracial marriage of the Harlem Renaissance between African American journalist George Schuyler and white Texan artist Josephine Cogdell.Philippa was a child prodigy. She had an IQ Of 185 and could read and write at the age of two and a half. She began playing the piano at the age of three. At four, she was composing and performed at the age of five on the radio. By age 11, she was touring with over 100 piano compositions by age 13. At the New York World's Fair, New York, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia declared June 19, 1940 " Philippa Duke Schuyler Day."
Schuler's visibility and fame were heightened by her father's media connections as well as her own regular coverage of exemplary progress in the Pittsburgh Courier. As a young adult, white America lost interest in her. She encountered, at this point, encountered the race prejudice from which she had previously been shielded from. She traveled to over 80 countries however, she was never invited to perform in the U.S for comparable leaders. Spending more than half of her last 10 years of her life abroad, Schuyler sought an alternative home where she could find comfort and acceptance. " I had 30 miserable years in U.S.A. because of having the taint of being a ' strange' curiousity' applied to me" - Philippa Schuyler
In the late 1950s, Schuyler traveled from Rome and performed to white audiences in South Africa. She then briefly toured in Europe as Felipa Monterro, a gifted musician and writer who was no longer identifiable as the daughter of a Negro journalist. Between 1960 and 1969, she published five books about her life and travels, including one in collaboration with her mother. In 1963, she was honored at the Delta Sigma Theta, the " We Salute Women of Achievement" awards along with Leontyne Price and Lena Horne.
Just before her death, Schuyler had begun a career as a news correspondent, publishing articles in several languages including French and German. She died at the age of 35 in a helicopter crash during the Vietnam War while attempting to rescue Catholic schoolchildren from a war zone in Hue to the shelter of a school in Da Nang.
