Countee Cullen was born on March 30, 1903, to Elizabeth Thomas Lucas. The location of his birth is not certain, but it is assumed he was born in either New York City or Louisville, Kentucky. His father is also unknown. In 1916, Cullen was living in the Bronx with a woman named Amanda Porter, generally assumed to be his grandmother, and attended school under the name Countee Porter. In 1918, after Porter’s death, he was adopted informally by a Methodist pastor, Reverend Frederick A. Cullen and his wife, Carolyn, and moved to live with them in Harlem. He attended from the prestigious Dewitt Clinton High School, where he enthusiastically participated in a myriad of school activities, such as serving in his student government and editing the school’s newspaper and literary magazine. He went on to study at New York University with a Regents Scholarship and earned a bachelor’s degree in 1925. He earned his master’s degree just one year later from Harvard University, Massachusetts.

Throughout his years in school, Cullen’s poetry was published in several nationwide magazines and newspapers. The young author, who began writing poetry at fourteen years old, was also winning an abundance of prestigious awards for his work, so when his first collection, Color, was published in 1925 he was already … [Cullen took a position teaching English and French at New York City Junior High School] …a well-known poet. His poems centered on race, but was exalted for presenting the issues in such a classical tradition. Cullen’s second collection, Copper Sun (1927), was not as well received because he did not address racial subjects as directly as his readers would have liked. However, he had been reared in a chiefly White environment and did not have the experience to socially comment on the matters brought to the forefront in the Harlem Renaissance. At that time, Cullen also helped edit the literary magazine Opportunity and wrote a regular column for the publication.

In 1928, Cullen published his third collection of poetry, titled The Ballad of the Brown Girl. That same year, he married W. E. B. DuBois’ daughter Nina Yolande DuBois in New York City and moved to Paris, France after receiving a Guggenheim Fellowship. His wife soon joined him abroad, but two years later filed for divorce when she learned Cullen was sexually attracted to men. Cullen’s writing after his first marriage did not receive the acclaim that his earlier writing achieved, but his novel One Way to Heaven (1932) was honored during the Harlem Renaissance as was his children’s literature. Cullen took a position teaching English and French at New York City Junior High School, even though he was offered jobs at several universities and colleges. He remarried Ida Mae Roberson in 1940 and taught until his death on January 9, 1946 in New York.