Astor, Joshua
Astor is the birth son of Joe "Gannex" Kagan, friend of the British prime minister Harold Wilson, but was adopted aged three by his step-father, Michael Astor, MP (one of the... [more]

Baca, Jimmy Santiago
When their parents divorced and abandoned them, Baca, aged two, and his siblings were sent to live with grandparents. By the time he was five his mother had been murdered by her second ... [more]

Bankhead, Tallulah
Bankhead was born into an illustrious American political family: her father was Speaker of the House of Representatives 1936-40. Her mother died shortly after she was born, and she was sent... [more]

Burton, Richard
Burton was born the 12th or youngest of 13 children in a poor mining family in South Wales. His mother died when he was quite young and he was then raised by his sister. Later he was foster... [more]

Callahan, John
Callahan was born to an unmarried woman in Portland, Oregon, and adopted as a baby by a childless couple who then had five birth children. He felt an outsider in his family and began to ... [more]

Cameron, Rhona
Cameron was born in Dundee or Musselburgh, Scotland, and adopted when she was very young. Her adoptive father also died, when she was 14, sending her into a long-term depression. She was... [more]

Capote, Truman
At the age of six Capote's parents abandoned him to the care of four elderly, unmarried maternal cousins, three sisters and a brother, living together. He was a high-school dropout, ... [more]

Connolly, Brian
Connolly was born to an unmarried woman and remained in hospital care until he was two, when he was fostered by the McManus family, who already had three born-to children. His foster brother... [more]

Cornwell, Patricia
Cornwell was born Patricia Daniels to a married couple. When she was five or seven (sources differ) her father abandoned the family for another woman. Her mother moved with the three children... [more]

Grey Owl
Note there are several versions of almost everything written about Grey Owl; in the following entry I give alternatives separated by a "/" without any particular preference for ... [more]

Harry, Deborah
Harry was adopted aged three months. Her family includes a born-to sister and a cousin who lived with her parents. She spent most of her twenties working at odd jobs, including spells as... [more]

Head, Bessie
Head was the child of a wealthy white South African woman and a Black servant when interracial relationships were illegal in South Africa. Her mother was sent to a mental hospital as punish... [more]

Hitler, Adolf
Among documents reportedly seized from Hitler's Munich home after World War II is a curious paper, apparently emanating after 1940 from the Gestapo. It suggests that he was the illegitimate... [more]

Jacobs, Peter
Jacobs' entire immediate family died while he was a young child and he grew up poor and alone. He converted to Christianity about 1827 and became an interpreter for Methodist missionaries... [more]

Kean, Edmund
Kean was the son of a poverty-stricken actress, Ann Carey, who more or less abandoned him on the streets, and (probably) an architect's clerk, Edmund Kean, who committed suicide when he was... [more]

La Marr, Barbara
La Marr was born Reatha Watson in central Washington state, but her parents moved to California when she was very young. She left home at the age of 14 and never returned, making a living a... [more]

Louganis, Gregory E.
Louganis is of Samoan-Swedish ancestry and was adopted when a few months old by a white couple who also adopted another child. He began competitive diving when he was 10. He had a troubled ... [more]

Monroe, Marilyn
Born Norma Jean Baker to an unmarried woman, Monroe was fostered from babyhood until about the age of seven, because her mother was working and not well enough to care for her as well. During... [more]

O'Connor, Hugh
O'Connor was born in Rome and adopted by the famous American actor Carroll O'Connor (All in the Family) and his wife while he was in Rome in acting in the 1963 film Cleopatra, with Richard ... [more]

Plato, Dana Michelle
Dana Plato's was the stereotypical life of a child star who couldn't make the transition to adult acting. She was the second child of a young unmarried birthmother who relinquished her for ... [more]

Poe, Edgar Allan
Poe's actor parents died before he was three years old (his father had disappeared before he was born and his mother died in 1811) and he was fostered (never formally adopted) by a merchant... [more]

Roach, Archie
Roach was one of the thousands of Aboriginal children stolen from their parents by the Australian government in an attempt to assimilate them into white society (see Australian Aboriginal ... [more]

Schweig, Eric
Schweig was born to an Inuit mother and a Chippewa Dene father in Inuvik, the Northwest Territories. At six months he was adopted by a German-Canadian family. During his childhood in ... [more]

Sherrin, Scott
Sherrin was a transracial adoptee, adopted by a white couple in London. His adoptive family included two born-two children and another adopted Black child. He showed great talent for ... [more]

Traynor, Joanna
Traynor is the daughter of an Irish-British mother and a Nigerian father. She was raised first in an children's home and then in two white foster families, where she was physically, emotion... [more]

Utrillo, Maurice
Utrillo was the son of Marie Clémentine ("Suzanne") Valadon, a well-known painter, and possibly a man named Boissy. He was adopted in 1891 by the Spanish journalist and architect ... [more]

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