NBC New York
Cicely Tyson paved the way as the first Black woman to have a recurring role in a dramatic TV series, and now she will be forever remembered at Cicely Tyson Way.
A stretch of 101st Street in East Harlem, between 3rd and Lexington, where the late actor grew up was renamed after her on Saturday. A group of supporters unveiled the street sign with claps and cheers.
"She actually spent time out here. She went to church in Harlem. She was famous," said Taina Traverso who's on the street renaming and landmark committee. "She did the work that she did. She was well known, but guess what? She never forgot where she came from."
Tyson died Jan. 28, 2021, at age 96.
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Tyson was known for the groundbreaking 1963 drama “East Side, West Side.” Her performance as a sharecropper's wife in the 1972 movie “Sounder” cemented her stardom and earned her an Oscar nomination.
She went on to win two Emmy Awards for playing the 110-year-old former slave in the 1974 television drama “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman” and another Emmy 20 years later for “Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All.”
At age 88, Tyson won a Tony Award for the revival of Horton Foote’s “The Trip to Bountiful” in 2013. President Barack Obama awarded her the Medal of Freedom in 2016.
