Ruby Ann Wallace was married to Frankie Dee Brown (blues singer) from 1941 but later divorced in 1945. In 1946, she got her first Broadway role in Jeb, a drama about a returning Black American war hero. There she met Ossie Davis (who played Jeb), and became close friends. They married on December 9, 1948.
Ruby and Ossie collaborated on several projects designed to promote Black heritage, especially Black artists. In 1974, they produced The Ruby Dee/Ossie Davis Story Hour for the National Black Network. In 1981, they produced the series With Ossie and Ruby for the Public Broadcasting System (PBS).
They have three children. Their son, Guy Davis, is a blues musician and former actor. They have two daughters, Nora Day and Hasna Muhammad.
Ruby and Ossie were involved in and supported several other civil rights protests and causes, includingMartin Luther King Jr.'s 1963 March on Washington. In 1970, the National Urban League honored them with the Frederick Douglass Award for distinguished leadership toward equal opportunity.
We would bring the whole family because...we couldn't hire babysitters and they had to have dinner. We just brought them all along but I can't say that people were always glad to see us and all our children...I grew up in a traditional way. It took me a long time to get it out of my head that my job was to stay home, look after the kids, and if money had to be made, I expected him to go out and get a job at the post office or do something - Ruby
In 1999, Ruby and Ossie were arrested for protesting the fatal shooting of an unarmed West African immigrant, Amadou Diallo, by White police officers of the New York City Police Department.
Together, Ruby and Ossie wrote an autobiography, Ossie and Ruby: In This Life Together, in which they discuss their political activism, careers, family, marriage, etc.
On March 11, 2001, Ruby and Ossie received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Screen Actors Guild.
In November 2005, Ruby and Ossie were awarded the Lifetime Achievement Freedom Award, presented by the National Civil Rights Museum located in Memphis, TN.
Source:
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