2Pac's "Brenda's Got a Baby" is one of hip-hop's most iconic tracks, and now the subject of the song is telling his story.
Author Jeff Pearlman has a new biography about the late rapper, titled Only God Can Judge Me, and one of the biggest revelations in the book is the story of Davonn Hodge, the real baby that inspired the 1991 song.
In an interview with Matt Barnes for his All the Smoke podcast, Pearlman and Hodge spoke about the story of how "Brenda’s Got a Baby" came to be and how Hodge was located.
"2Pac was filming Juice, his first movie, and one day he gets an article, he reads the New York Daily News because he got the newspaper every day," Pearlman said, revealing that this was in 1990. "There’s an article, Cries in the Dark. He reads it and it’s about a 12-year-old girl in public housing in Brooklyn, who was raped by a cousin, gave birth to the baby on the floor, wrapped the baby in an odd job plastic bag, threw the baby down a trash heap."
As detailed in the original article, it was disposal day when the 12-year-old mother threw the baby down a garbage chute, but thankfully, someone heard the cries of the child and was able to save them.
"They take the baby to the hospital, and they later take the mother to the hospital," Pearlman continued. "2Pac reads this article, and he says to Omar Epps, his co-star, 'Holy shit.' Goes into his trailer, he says, 'Leave me alone for a little.' Comes back out, truly on a piece of paper: 'Brenda’s Got a baby, Brenda’s barely got a brain / A damn shame the girl can hardly spell her name.'"
He spoke to a genealogist named Michele Soulli, who he also attended Mahopac High School with, and said it would be incredible if she could help track down the baby that inspired the song. Soulli was able to track down the identity of the baby, and within a week or so, Pearlman was able to meet and sit down with Davonn Hodge. "He’s one of the best people you will ever meet," Pearlman added.
Hodge was asked how his story inspired the song, and remarked it was interesting how a $99 ancestry DNA test "unlocked" such a revelation. "I found out a little bit before Jeff," Hodge said. "As soon as I did the ancestry test, I reached out to the closest family members on there. When you do an ancestry test, you never know what’s going to pop up. I wasn’t really doing it for the family side, it was more of the diaspora side."
When his parents passed away, just 10 months apart, it led him to taking the test. When he called a relative, they put him in contact with 10 different people who shared their stories. "They’re showing me the newspaper clips of back in the day and was telling me about what happened," he said. "It would have been hard for them to find me, to be honest with you. My last name changed. … My mom did a good job sheltering me from that exposure."
He said that he was adopted when he "probably" around five months old. "Due to the magnitude of the situation, they wouldn’t let me stay with her," he added. "Me and my mom had visitation rights till I was around two." He didn’t identify his birth mother by name, because he respects her decision to not be involved with the media coverage of the story.
He said that his adoptive mother never told her that his biological mother was raped, but she did say that she had to give him up for adoption. "I lived 32 years without knowing," he continued. "Listening to this song my whole life, you know what I’m saying?" Barnes joked that they weren’t going to hold it against him that he’s a Biggie fan, and he laughed, "You know, I’m from Brooklyn, so Biggie will always be number one to me."
After Pearlman met with Hodge, he was able to track down his biological mother, too, who instantly cried on the phone, "Do you know where my son is?" She told Pearlman that she had been looking for her son for about 20 years, and that she was living in New Jersey. At the time, however, she was away in Las Vegas for a Red Hot Chili Peppers show. Hodge lives just 20 minutes from Las Vegas, so they were able to be reunited that same night.
Pearlman’s Only God Can Judge Me hits all book stores on October 21.
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