Wonder was born on May 13, 1950, in Saginaw, Michigan, as Stevland Hardaway Judkins, the third of five children born to Lula Mae Hardaway and the second of Hardaway’s two children with Calvin Judkins.
He was born six weeks premature, which, combined with the oxygen-rich environment in the hospital incubator, caused retinopathy of prematurity, a condition in which the growth of the eyes is halted and the retinas detach, causing him to go blind.
Wonder’s mother divorced his father when he was four years old and moved with her three children to Detroit, Michigan, where Wonder sang in a choir at the Whitestone Baptist Church as a child. She later rekindled her relationship with her first child’s father (who also happened to have the surname Hardaway) and changed her name back to Lula Hardaway, having two more children.
When Stevie was signed by Motown in 1961, his surname was legally changed to Morris, which was an old family name, according to Lula Mae Hardaway’s authorized biography. Berry Gordy was the man behind “Little Stevie Wonder’s” stage name.
Who is Stevie Wonder’s wife Syreeta Wright?
During the 1970s, Syreeta Wright co-wrote many popular songs with Stevie Wonder, to whom she was briefly married.
Despite her lack of commercial success and her star never quite rising, Wright was a prolific writer in her own right.
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