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Herb
Jeffrey, The Bronze Buckaroo
In 1946, Herb Jeffrey was in convalescence in Detroit, Michigan
after incurring severe back injuries received in an airplane crash.
Out of desperation to relieve his pain, this famous movie star and
singer of the 1937-38 Black cowboy films, The Bronze Buckaroo,
Two Gun Man from Harlem and Harlem Rides the Range,
began reading the Autobiography
of a Yogi by Paramhansa Yogananda.
Touched
in some magical way by author’s vibration, Herb decided it
would be worth the try to contact “The Yogi” and see if
he could do something to help correct his injured spine.
So, Herb visited Yogananda in Los Angeles at the Self-Realization
Fellowship’s (SRF) headquarters on top of Mt. Washington. But
when he arrived at the ashram unannounced, one of the SRF Nuns greeted
this “jive-talking” guy with indifference and tried to
convince him to schedule an appointment. Before she could set a
time for him to see Yogananda, Master somehow overheard the encounter
from his upstairs room and called out urgently, “Sister, send
him up! Send him up!”
Herb had a blessed encounter with Yogananda. He told Master about
his life as a jazz singer for the Duke Ellington Band and about
the airplane crash that injured his spine. Yogananda told Herb a
few things about how to relieve the pain in his back and correct
the spinal injuries. After several sessions with him, Herb was able
to eventually control the pain and rid himself of his back problems.
His doctors were so amazed by this recovery that they considered
it a miracle, since they had advised Herb that surgery was the only
recourse.
Astonished by Yogananda's intuitive knowledge to cure him, Herb
decided to become a follower of Master's teachings and took Kriya
Yoga initiation from Reverend Walters (Swami
Kriyananda, the founder of Ananda) in Yogananda's name. Until
this day, Herbert Jeffries has continued to be a life-long disciple
of Paramhansa Yogananda.
See a picture of Herb Jeffrey
and Yogananda linked here. They are pictured together on Yogananda’s
last birthday, on January 5, 1952, just two months before the master’s
passing. This photograph can be seen in the July/August 1952 Self-Realization
Fellowship Magazine, which reported on Yogananda's Mahasamadhi,
a great yogi’s conscious passing from this world.
In July 1998, Herb Jeffrey led a spiritual gathering for the first
time with a group of devotees of Yogananda. (He was 87 years old
at the time, but he looked like he was in his 60s.) A pilgrimage
group of about twenty or so people from the Ananda
Assisi community met at the Smeraldi’s Restaurant, located
at the Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. During this occasion,
Herb spoke very intimately about his time with Yogananda and told
many wonderful stories. The following article contains excerpts
of Herb's talk, along with a simple recording of him singing a song
he wrote as a tribute to Paramhansa Yogananda, entitled “A
Man on a Hill” in which he closed the evening. Herb
Jeffrey's Interview. Herb
Jeffrey sings a song he wrote, dedicated to Master
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