Louis Armstrong’s Queens Home Now a Shrine to His Genius

After marrying his fourth wife, Lucille Wilson, in 1942, trumpeter Louis Armstrong was ready to settle down. Now the modest house on 107th street in the Corona section of Queens where he and Lucille resided is a National Historic Landmark. Fulfilling Lucille’s long-held dream that the home become a shrine to her late husband, it opened to the public as the Louis Armstrong House Museum on Oct. 15, 2003. Armstrong lived in this 11-room house for nearly three decades and died there in his sleep on July 6, 1971. Twenty-nine years earlier, having wooed and wed Lucille, Armstrong decided to put down roots in that decidedly working-class neighborhood. Home At Last The world’s premiere American jazzman, Armstrong first played music while at the Colored Waif’s Home for Boys in his native New Orleans, became a star in Chicago in the mid-1920s, made major appearances and recordings on both coasts and toured Europe in 1931 partly to avoid the Chicago gangsters who controlled most of the Windy City’s entertainment industry. Finally, he hired a new manager, Joe Glaser, a mob-connected wheeler-dealer who straightened out his legal entanglements, his gangster worries and his debts. Armstrong endured problems with his fingers and lips aggravated by his unorthodox horn-playing-style. So he branched out, developing his vocal style and making his first theatrical appearances and several m