Master tap dancer, instructor

ERNEST 'BROWNIE' BROWN - 1916-2009

Ernest '"Brownie" Brown tapped into a tradition of American dance and entertainment that stretched back to the days of Harlem's Cotton Club and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson.

"Brownie was one of the last of the generation of men and women who crossed the lines from vaudeville to Broadway to movies to television," said Lane Alexander, founder and director of the Chicago Human Rhythm Project. "His career spanned the whole 20th century of American entertainment. He represented an important link in the chain of performers and teachers who passed the oral tradition of American tap from one generation to the next.''

He was the short funny …