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14 flagships · 25 briefs · 8 dossiers · 1,441 entities — record updated October 4, 2026

Lil Hardin Armstrong

CTL-E-0504 · Person · 1922–1971

PROVISIONAL evidence grade of this record

Lil Hardin was the pianist and arranger of King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band in Chicago and married Louis Armstrong in 1924. Hardin pushed Armstrong to leave Oliver's band and join Fletcher Henderson in New York, and later led her own band at Chicago's Dreamland Café.

The record

Notes

Merged into canonical KG 2026-10-03 from MUSIC-001; source entity IDs: CTL-DR-MUSIC-001:music-001-person-016; source research type(s): person. Description completed 2026-10-03 from the source research record (claims) during the KG completion pass.

Sources

Record CTL-E-0504 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · evidence grade: PROVISIONAL · 2 sources · CTL research: MUSIC-001.
Directory: all entity records · the knowledge graph

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Cite as: CultureTechLens, “Lil Hardin Armstrong (CTL-E-0504),” CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph, October 2026. https://culturetechlens.com/graph/entities/ctl-e-0504/

Chicago: CultureTechLens. “Lil Hardin Armstrong (CTL-E-0504).” CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph. Chicago, IL: CultureTechLens, 2026. https://culturetechlens.com/graph/entities/ctl-e-0504/
APA: CultureTechLens. (2026). Lil Hardin Armstrong (CTL-E-0504) [Entity record]. CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph. https://culturetechlens.com/graph/entities/ctl-e-0504/
MLA: CultureTechLens. “Lil Hardin Armstrong (CTL-E-0504).” CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph, 2026, https://culturetechlens.com/graph/entities/ctl-e-0504/

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From the Archive

The archive in pictures

The people, places, and institutions this work documents. Photographs from the CultureTechLens research record — rights-cleared, credited, and cited like everything else here.

Apartment houses and funeral parlor in Negro section of Chicago, Illinois, Chicago, 1941
Apartment houses and funeral parlor in Negro section of Chicago, Illinois, Chicago, 1941Photo: Lee, Russell, 1903-1986, FSA-OWI, Public Domain, via Library of Congress
Crowd outside of fashionable Negro church after Easter Sunday service, Black Belt, Chicago, Illinois, Chicago, 1941
Crowd outside of fashionable Negro church after Easter Sunday service, Black Belt, Chicago, Illinois, Chicago, 1941Photo: Rosskam, Edwin, 1903-1985, FSA-OWI, Public Domain, via Library of Congress
Negro grocery store, Black Belt, Chicago, Illinois, Chicago, 1941
Negro grocery store, Black Belt, Chicago, Illinois, Chicago, 1941Photo: Rosskam, Edwin, 1903-1985, FSA-OWI, Public Domain, via Library of Congress

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