By Roland Godefroy [GFDL], via Wikimedia Commons
Not all stars come from the Big Apple or the hills of Hollywood. In fact, there are many of them who were born in much smaller places and then had to (or wanted to) move out because of certain circumstances. We bet you didn’t know that Lil Wayne is from New Orleans, Louisiana, or that Bruce Willis was born in a German town with a population less than 30,000 people.
Likewise, we believe that you don’t know many of the prominent people coming from the Sugar State, and to help you with that, we’ve compiled a list of the top 21 celebrities who were born in Louisiana.
1. Fats Domino
The world famous singer and musician Antoine “Fats” Domino was born in New Orleans on February 26, 1928, as one of the nine siblings in a musical family. An interesting fact is that he spoke Creole long before he learned how to speak English. His brother-in-law Harrison Verret did him a huge favor by teaching him how to play the piano and introducing him to the New Orleans music scene.
By the age of 10, Fats was already performing as both a singer and a pianist, and at 14, he decided to drop out of high school to work odd jobs, including working in a factory and hauling ice while playing music for peanuts during the evenings to get people to hear about him. His breakthrough came in 1946 when he started playing piano for Billy Diamond, a renowned bass player and band leader, and it was him who gave Domino his famous nickname. Fats’ musical talents quickly made him a sensation, and by as early as 1949, he was drawing huge amounts of people to his shows.