📍East Orange, NJ, USA
1970 – 1989“Dana Elaine Owens was born in Newark, New Jersey, in March 1970, and grew up mainly in East Orange, a busy, largely Black suburb just west of the city. Her father, Lancelot Owens, was a police officer, and her mother, Rita, was an art teacher at Irvington High School. Her parents divorced when she was ten, but her father stayed close, and her mother raised Dana and her older brother, Lancelot Jr., known as Winki, with warmth and high expectations; for a time they lived in a housing project in Newark while her mother saved money. When Dana was eight, a cousin gave her the nickname Latifah, Arabic for delicate and very kind, and she loved it. She went to Catholic school in Newark and then to Irvington High School, where her mother taught. Tall and athletic, she played power forward on the school's basketball team, which won two state championships, and she sang in the school's production of The Wiz. She also began rapping, with an all-female group called Ladies Fresh, and beatboxing for friends, and a local DJ, Mark the 45 King, recorded her demo, Wrath of My Madness. In 1988 she signed with Tommy Boy Records, and her album All Hail the Queen, with its anthem Ladies First, made her a pioneer of positive, feminist hip-hop. She went on to star in the television show Living Single and in films such as Chicago, which brought her an Academy Award nomination, and to win Grammy, Emmy and Golden Globe awards. She created a scholarship fund in memory of her brother Winki, and New Jersey has inducted her into its Hall of Fame.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today