Opera Singer. A soprano who starred on Broadway and in films, she is remembered for creating the role of Serena at the September 30, 1935 world premiere of George Gershwin's "Porgy and Bess". Raised in northern Mississippi under poor conditions, she learned spirituals at a young age and first sang in public at her church when she was four. In 1927, while a freshman at Rust College in Holly Springs, Mississippi, she was heard by professor C.C. McCracken of Ohio State University who arranged her transfer to his school. In Columbus, she had to overcome not only her inability to read music but the racial prejudice of the day. By the time of her 1930 graduation, however, she ranked first in the music department and had received a fellowship for graduate study at Juilliard, from which she was to earn degrees in 1934. While there she became part of the Harlem Renaissance, appeared on both Broadway and the radio, and was hired as a soloist for J. Rosamond Johnson's choir. When the group appeared in the 1933 film "The Emperor Jones", Ruby was cast in the role of Dolly opposite Paul Robeson. During the movie's production she met screenwriter DuBose Heyward who was working with Gershwin on "Porgy and Bess"; an audition was arranged and Ruby was selected as Serena after singing the spiritual "City Called Heaven". When the show opened in Boston audiences heard her sing Serena's mournful "My Man's Gone Now", her lament after her husband Robbins is killed in a crap game. Despite performing her role about 800 times and "My Man's Gone Now" becoming her signature piece, she was not limited to "Porgy and Bess"; she appeared in "John Henry" with Robeson and in the hit "Run Little Chillun", as well as becoming a regular on network radio. After performing with Gershwin and the New York Philharmonic in 1936, she sang in both New York and Hollywood at the composer's memorial concerts the next year. Her October 1937 Town Hall debut led to an invitation from Eleanor Roosevelt to sing at the White House; living in Hollywood from 1938 until 1941, she recorded Harold Arlen's "Reverend Johnson's Dream", married her second husband, actor Jack Carr, and starred in 1941's "Birth of the Blues" with Bing Crosby and Mary Martin. Ruby returned to Broadway for the 1942 revival of "Porgy and Bess" and had recently signed a contract to sing the title role in Verdi's "Aida" when she died of complications following routine surgery to remove a benign tumor. Rust College, Ohio State, and Juilliard have all honored her memory, and in 2000 she joined Elvis Presley, B.B. King, Tammy Wynette, Leontyne Price, and others in the charter class of the Mississippi Music Hall of Fame. Most of her small recorded legacy is preserved on CD; Ruby's story was told in David Weaver's 2004 "Black Diva of the Thirties: The Life of Ruby Elzy".