 A 1955 interview in the "Chicago Defender" is the earliest in which he stated 1915 as the year of his birth, and he continued to say this in interviews from that point onward.The 1920 census lists him as five years old as of March 6, 1920, suggesting that his birth year may have been 1914.The Social Security Death Index, relying on the Social Security card application submitted after his move to Chicago in the mid-1940s, lists him as being born April 4, 1913.