Gordy family
| Ethnicity | African American |
|---|---|
| Current region | Detroit, Michigan |
| Place of origin | United States |
| Members | Berry Gordy, Esther Gordy Edwards, Anna Gordy Gaye, Gwen Gordy Fuqua, Robert Gordy, Kerry Gordy, Kennedy William Gordy, Rhonda Ross Kendrick, Stefan Kendal Gordy, Denise Gordy, Bianca Lawson, Skyler Austen Gordy, Kamille Gordy |
| Connected families | Bristol, Brown, Bullock, Gaye, Lawson, Wakefield, Fuqua, Jackson, Kendrick, Carter |
| Estate | Motown Historical Museum |
The Gordys are an African-American family of businesspeople and music industry executives. They were born to Georgia-reared parents Berry "Pops" Gordy, Sr. and Bertha Fuller Gordy and raised in Detroit, where most of the siblings played a pivotal role in the international acceptance of rhythm and blues music as a crossover phenomenon in the 1960s. The accomplishment is attributable to the creation of Motown, a company founded by the seventh-oldest sibling, Berry Gordy, Jr.
As a couple, Berry and Bertha owned several businesses, including a successful painting business that they established, and a construction firm. Berry, Sr. (or Berry II) established a Booker T. Washington grocery store in Detroit, while Bertha co-founded the Friendship Mutual Life Insurance Company. Later, Berry Sr. mentored several recording acts for his son's Motown label.
Bertha died in 1975. Berry II died in 1978. A tribute album, called Pops, We Love You!, and single, called "Pops, We Love You (A Tribute to Father)", were released later that year in his memory.
The eldest Gordy child, Fuller B. Gordy (September 9, 1918 – November 9, 1991), born in Georgia, was an executive alongside his younger siblings in their brother Berry's Motown music company. Fuller was also a professional in bowling. His daughter Iris was married to singer Johnny Bristol.
The eldest Gordy daughter, Esther (April 25, 1920 – August 24, 2011), born in Georgia, established herself early in business as a political campaigner for her husband, Detroit politician George Edwards. In the late 1950s, she formed a loan company named after her parents; in 1959, she helped her brother Berry with a $800 loan to start Tamla Records. She borrowed the proceeds from the college tuition fund their father had established for Berry. Edwards served as mentor, adviser, and vice president of Motown's main offices from 1961 until 1972, when Berry moved the entire operation to Los Angeles. In 1985, she founded the Motown Historical Museum at the site of the former Hitsville U.S.A. studios, where many of Motown's successful recording artists recorded. Esther died in 2011 at the age of 91.
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