🌟Graduated from Booker T. Washington High School in 1936
🌟As a child, Russell entertained audiences by singing and tap-dancing with a troupe called the Ragamuffins of Rhythm. 
🌟As a teenager, Russell worked as a carhop at Atlanta’s legendary Varsity Drive-In where he delivered jokes with each order.
🌟Joined the U.S. Army in 1941 to fight in World War II and rose to the rank of captain before being discharged in 1946.
🌟By the 1950s, Russell was a regular at Harlem’s Club Baby Grand and always came across as a folk philosopher, delivering his jokes as aphorisms and rhymes. He also became a favorite at Harlem’s Apollo Theater and earned the nickname “Harlem’s Son of Fun.” 
🌟From 1950 to 1952, Russell appeared on the variety show The Show Goes On that aired on CBS 
🌟Between the years of 1955 and 1956, he appeared in musical programs such as Rhythm and Blues Revue, Rock ‘n’ Roll Revue, and Basin Street Revue. 
🌟By the early 1960s he was popular enough to make guest appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show and The Tonight Show.
🌟During the early 1960s, Russell made television history as an African American playing Officer Anderson in the NBC comedy Car 54, Where Are You? Russell also appeared in other television shows including Missing Links, What’s My Line?, Match Game, Hollywood Squares, To Tell the Truth, and The $50,000 Pyramid.
🌟By the 1970s Russell became a Hollywood actor appearing in movies including The Wiz (1978) where he starred alongside Michael Jackson, Diana Ross, Richard Pryor, and fellow Washingtonian, Lena Horne. Nemo (1984), Wildcats (1986), Posse (1993). 
🌟During the 1990s, Russell continued to make appearances on shows like Late Night with Conan O’Brien and The Chris Rock Show on HBO
🌟Russell’s career inspired rapper Ermias Joseph Asghedom to adopt the stage name NIPSEY HUSSLE

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Source: NotableBiographies.com, BlackPast.org, BTW Archives