Walter Fuller, 93; Jazz Musician, Civil-Rights Pioneer

He traveled with medicine shows in his youth, a precocious musician doubling as a rattlesnake-toting stagehand for a doctor of potions and tonics.

He played his trumpet at Chicago speakeasies in the Al Capone era, often surrounded by armed patrons of dubious reputation.

And for several years, before and during World War II, he was lead trumpeter and vocalist for legendary jazz pianist Earl Fatha Hines.

When Walter Fuller made his home in San Diego in 1946, he gave the area's jazz scene an uplifting sense of pride and prestige. Moreover, he opened doors for fellow blacks, helping to integrate seating at a downtown club and becoming the first black musician to be contracted by the Hotel del Coronado, El Cortez Hotel and Torrey Pines Inn.

Mr. Fuller, who also was the first black board member of the San Diego Musicians Union Local 325, died Sunday at St. Paul's John McColl Family Health Care Center. He was 93.

He had been suffering from diabetes and related illnesses, said his longtime friend, the Rev. George Walker Smith.

An original member of Hines' big band, Mr. Fuller flirted with fame by singing lead vocal on the 1933 hit Rosetta, which became his signature song and was so popular that the band released two versions.

Mr. Fuller was so closely identified with the tune that it became his nickname, and years later he named his daughter Rosetta.

When Hines disbanded his orchestra to create a combo, Mr. Fuller started his own band, eventually adding a vocalist named Ruth Jones, who later became famous as Dinah Washington.

In 1946, after a stint with Lionel Hampton's band, Mr. Fuller left to form his own group again and accepted a month engagement at Club Royal in downtown San Diego.

The month turned into more than a decade, but the San Diego of the era was a very prejudiced town, he told Dan Del Fiorentino in an oral history recorded for the Museum of Making Music in Carlsbad.

When Club Royal limited the seating of blacks to the back seats, even though many seats up front remained empty, Mr. Fuller insisted the owners change the policy.

After threatening to fire him, the owners relented, but said they would hold Mr. Fuller responsible if racial conflicts arose.

None did. Pretty soon, A.J. Kahn bought into the Club Royal and things in San Diego began opening up for blacks, Mr. Fuller told The San Diego Union-Tribune in February.

In 1952, Mr. Fuller became the first black director on the local board of the American Federation of Musicians, a post he held until he retired in 1986.

Before he joined the local, he insisted that its membership directory eliminate separate listings for whites and blacks. Thereafter, members' names were alphabetized irrespective of ethnicity.

Mr. Fuller's civil-rights breakthroughs were largely without fanfare, owing to his low-key style.

He was very low profile, said Eddie Arias, secretary-treasurer. He didn't want the focus on him.

He was very kind-hearted, with nothing negative to say about anything or anybody.

After breaking the hotel color line in San Diego with a 22-week engagement at the Torrey Pines Inn, Mr. Fuller began a two-year run at the Hotel del Coronado at the invitation of then-owner Larry Lawrence.

He also became one of the first black musicians to play in clubs in Mission Valley, along with saxophonist Teddy Picou, recalled Lou Curtiss, a longtime observer of the San Diego music scene and owner of Folk Arts Rare Records in Normal Heights.

Had he not settled in San Diego, which has sadly never been a mecca for jazz, Fuller would probably have been an internationally prominent artist for the duration of his career, said George Varga, the Union-Tribune's pop music critic.

He was probably best known for two songs he recorded with Earl Hines in the 1930s, “Rosetta' and “After All I've Been To You,' but he was versatile enough to have recorded with a “modernist' like Charles Mingus and to briefly lead the Fletcher Henderson Orchestra.

Mr. Fuller was born in Dyersburg, Tenn. He learned to play the mellophone from his father, who played in circus and medicine shows.

As an adolescent, Walter Fuller spent summers in the medicine show of Dr. Stell, who set up a large stage in tents.

It was a free show, he told The San Diego Union in 1980. We'd put on a real good show with the band and singers and all. Then Dr. Stell would bring out the rattlesnakes, then he'd go into his spiel and sell his medicines.

Mr. Fuller, the youngest person in the group, carried the snakes on stage in a cage. One night, the bottom of the cage fell out.

I did a fast flip-flop and got out of there, he said.

He went on to play for bands in New York City and Chicago, where he courted a dancer, Ida Vincent, who became his wife, and played at a club operated by gangsters.

As long as you didn't fool with their business, it was OK, he told The San Diego Union. And the tips were fabulous.

He played for more conventional crowds in San Diego. At one of his venues, the former Moonglow in Clairemont, the Rev. Smith often saw him play.

When I walked in the door, he would stop whatever he was playing and strike up one of my favorite numbers, “Goin' to Kansas City,' Smith said.

He would get off work about 2 a.m. on a Saturday night, greet his fans and by the time he got home it would be 3 or 3:30.

After a couple hours' sleep, he would get up and take his wife to St. Regis Catholic Church, then come down to our church (Christ United Presbyterian).

I would say to the congregation, “Don't wake him. He's the only one who has license to sleep if he wants, because if you knew his schedule ... '

Survivors include his daughter, Rosetta Fuller of San Diego; two grandchildren; two great-grandchildren; and one great-great grandchild.