Editing Ralph Ellison (section)

==Early life==
Ralph Waldo Ellison, named after [[Ralph Waldo Emerson]],<ref name=guzzio>{{cite news|last= Guzzio| first= Tracie|year=2003|title=Ralph Ellison|work=American Writers Retrospective Supplement|volume= 2|editor-first= Jay |editor-last= Parini|location=New York| publisher= [[Charles Scribner's Sons]]| pages= 113–20}}</ref> was born in [[Oklahoma City]], Oklahoma, to Lewis Alfred Ellison and Ida Millsap, on March 1, 1913. He was the second of three sons; firstborn Alfred died in infancy, and younger brother Herbert Maurice (or Millsap) was born in 1916.<ref name= age /> Lewis Alfred Ellison, a small-business owner and a construction foreman, died in 1916, after work-related injury and a failed operation.<ref name=guzzio/><ref name= bio>{{cite book| first= Arnold| last= Rampersad|title= Ralph Ellison: A Biography| place= New York| publisher= Alfred A. Knopf| year= 2007| isbn= 978-0375408274}}</ref> The elder Ellison loved literature, and doted on his children. Ralph later discovered, as an adult, that his father had hoped he would grow up to be a poet.

In 1921, Ellison's mother and her children moved to [[Gary, Indiana]], where she had a brother.<ref name= "Als 2007">{{cite magazine| author-link= Hilton Als| first= Hilton |last= Als | url= http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/05/07/in-the-territory |title= In the Territory: A Look at the life of Ralph Ellison| magazine= [[The New Yorker]]| date= May 7, 2007| access-date= March 17, 2016}}</ref> According to Ellison, his mother felt that "my brother and I would have a better chance of reaching manhood if we grew up in the north." When she did not find a job and her brother lost his, the family returned to Oklahoma, where Ellison worked as a busboy, a shoeshine boy, hotel waiter, and a dentist's assistant.<ref name="Als 2007" /> From the father of a neighborhood friend, he received free lessons for playing trumpet and alto saxophone, and would go on to become the school bandmaster.<ref name="Als 2007"/>

Ida remarried three times after Lewis died.{{efn|Her second marriage ended before 1924. On July 8, 1924, she married James Ammons, who died in 1926. In December 1929 she married John Bell.}} However, the family life was precarious, and Ralph worked various jobs during his youth and teens to assist with family support. While attending [[Frederick A. Douglass High School|Douglass High School]], he also found time to play on the school's football team.<ref name=bio/> He graduated from high school in 1931. He worked for a year, and found the money to make a down payment on a trumpet, using it to play with local musicians, and to take further music lessons. At Douglass, he was influenced by principal [[Inman E. Page]] and his daughter, music teacher [[Zelia N. Breaux]].<ref name=bio/>