A portrait of a black boy is popular on social networks; the photograph allegedly shows the future great jazzman. We have checked the correctness of such publications.
Internet users often accompany photos of supposedly little Louis Armstrong with posts about how he was adopted by the Jewish Karnofsky family, to whose head the musician subsequently dedicated the song Go Down Moses (this story is “Verified” sorted it out previously). In a similar way, the photograph was used, in particular, by some large public pages on VKontakte, including “5 interesting facts» (4.4 million subscribers at the time of writing this analysis), History Facts (990 000), "Success Diary» (972,000), Grand History (816,000), "What inspires...» (609,000), "New land» (460,000), H.S. (262,000) and "Modern theater» (254,000). Users also write that the photographer captured the young Louis Armstrong Facebook* And Twitter, as well as the authors of biographical notes about the musician on some websites.
The Jewish Karnovsky family took pity on the 7-year-old black boy and took him into their home. When he went to bed, Mrs. Karnovsky sang a Russian lullaby to him. He knew several Russian and Jewish songs. The boy spoke Yiddish fluently and wore a Star of David. And his name was Louis Armstrong pic.twitter.com/b1afA4FfrZ
— Historical Photos (@HistoryFoto) August 17, 2022
Using reverse image search original The image is easy to find on the website of the US Library of Congress. The photo caption reads: “African American boy holds fruit received from the Red Cross as part of a relief effort. drought in Mississippi." The photo was provided by photographer Lewis Weeks Hine and was taken in 1930 or 1931. The card in the library's online catalog does not indicate that the photo is of Louis Armstrong.
However, in 1930–1931 the musician looked different, because he was born 30 years earlier. IN photo gallery On the Louis Armstrong Educational Foundation website there is a photograph of a trumpeter taken in 1931 in Chicago:
As for the story itself, as told in the verified publications, seven-year-old Louis Armstrong was indeed taken into the care of the Jewish Karnofsky family - the boy helped in their small enterprise and delivered coal, and Karnofsky Sr. even lent him money to buy his first instrument. Although Armstrong spoke very warmly in his memoirs about the Jews who helped him, this family didn't adopt, and at the age of 11 the boy ended up in an orphanage.
Reputable sources do not confirm the veracity of most of the other statements in the text, often published along with a photograph allegedly of Armstrong as a child. For example, there is no evidence that the musician spoke fluent Yiddish (although several photographs survive of him wearing a Star of David pendant). Ricky Ricciardi, director of collections research at the New York House Museum Louis Armstrong, just last year wrote a large analysis of publications that had become viral, lamenting that he had already done this when identical texts became popular on social networks in 2016 and 2018.
*Russian authorities think Meta Platforms Inc., which owns the social network Facebook, is an extremist organization; its activities in Russia are prohibited.
Cover photo: Library of Congress
Not true
- AFP Fact Check. Dieses Foto zeigt nicht den Musiker Louis Armstrong
- Check Your Fact. NO, THIS IS NOT A PICTURE OF LOUIS ARMSTRONG AS A CHILD
- Is it true that Louis Armstrong dedicated the song Go Down Moses to his Jewish adoptive father?
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