Jack Leroy Wilson Jr. was born in Highland Park, Michigan, on June 9, 1934, as the third and only surviving child of singer Jack Leroy Wilson, Sr. (1903-1983) and Eliza Mae Wilson (1900–1975). Eliza Mae was born in Lowndes County, Mississippi, on the Billups-Whitfield Place. Tom and Virginia Ransom were Eliza Mae’s parents.

Wilson frequently visited his family in Columbus and was influenced greatly by the choir at Billups Chapel. Wilson, who grew up in the Detroit suburb of Highland Park, joined a gang called the Shakers and frequently got himself into trouble. Wilson’s father, an alcoholic, was frequently absent and usually unemployed. His parents divorced shortly after Jackie’s ninth birthday in 1943.

Jackie Wilson began singing when he was a child, accompanying his mother, a seasoned church choir singer. In his early adolescence, he joined the Ever Ready Gospel Singers, a quartet that gained popularity in local churches. Wilson was not religious, but he enjoyed public singing. The quartet’s earnings from performances were frequently spent on alcohol, and Wilson began drinking at a young age.

Wilson dropped out of high school at the age of 15, after being sentenced twice to juvenile detention in the Lansing Corrections system. Wilson learned to box during his second stint in detention and began competing in the Detroit amateur circuit at the age of 16. Wilson’s Golden Gloves record was 2 and 8. Wilson was forced to marry Freda Hood after becoming pregnant by her father after his mother forced Jackie to quit boxing, and he became a father at the age of 17.

Who is Jackie Wilson’s wife Freda Hood?

Wilson married his pregnant girlfriend Freda Hood at the age of 17 in 1951. They had four children: Jacqueline Denise (1951-1988), Sandra Kay (1953-1977), Jack Leroy Jr (1954-1970), and Anthony Duane. Hood divorced Wilson in 1965, after 14 years of marriage, because she was fed up with his notorious womanizing.