Billie Holiday

Hi everyone - we recently posted a Billie Holiday snapshot. The following is our biography of her. Please note that Billie experienced and sang about traumatic events. Some are included in this story.

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"Billie Holiday—she was the nicest woman in the world, you know. All she wanted to do was sing." - Miles Davis

Early Years

Her mother was thirteen, pop was fifteen at the time of Billie's birth. Just kids. Unwed. And poor. They named their daughter Eleanora. Her last name was Fagan. It came from a plantation owner who fathered sixteen children with Billie's great-grandmother, an enslaved woman.

About her name, Billie would say,

"My name, Eleanora, was too damn long for anyone to say. Besides, I never liked it. Especially not after my Grandma shortened it and used to scream "Nora!" at me from the back porch. My father had started calling me Bill because I was such a tomboy. I didn't mind that, but I wanted to be pretty, too, and have a pretty name. So I decided Billie was it and I made it stick."