Biography

Born on April 17, 1917 Ella Fitzgerald was raised in the integrated neighborhood of Newport News, Virginia. Soon after she was born, her parents, William and Temperance Fitzgerald, separated, leaving her and her mother alone. This changed when Temperance, also known as Tempie, developed a romantic relationship with Joseph Da Silva. She began to think of her mother's boyfriend as her step-father. Six years later, her half-sister was born. In 1932, her mother died of complications from injuries from a car crash. Her aunt took her in, and soon after that, her step-father died of a heart-attack. She then sunk into a depression and started acting out. Fitzgerald was then sent to a reform school where they believed in corporal punishment. Soon after she was sent there, she managed to escape. Now she was alone and poor with no home in the Great Depression.
     In 1934 she was picked at random to compete in an Amateur Night, where she planned to dance, but, at the last second, changed her mind and started to sing. One year later, she won a chance to perform at the Harlem Opera House,  and in 1936 she made her first recording, "Love and Kisses." Still, she wasn't well-known. Two years later, in 1938, she recorded the nusery rhyme "A-Tisket, A-Tasket". This sold over one million copies, hit number one, and stayed on the charts for 17 weeks. Sadly, on June 16, 1939,  her mentor died, leaving her with his band, that was re-named "Ella Fitzgerald and her Famous Band." Because of this, she began to feel very unstable and, as a result, married Benny Konegay. She soon learned he had a criminal record and divorced him immediately. While she was on tour with Dizzy Gillespie's Band in 1946, she met and fell in love with bassist Ray Brown. They married and adopted a son later on.  From 1956-1964 she mostly recorded covers of other musicians songs. She then started appearing on television shows. Because of her and her husband's extremely busy schedules, their relationship with not only each other, but their son, became very strained. In 1952, she divorced Brown and never re-married. Fitzgerald was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 1978.
    In September of 1986, she underwent a quintuple by-pass surgery. Amazingly, she survived this surgery but was then diagnosed with diabetes. Her condition worsened and as a result, she had to have both of her legs amputated below the knee. On June 15, 1996, Ella Fitzgerald died in her home.