Florence Ballard of the Supremes

If anyone ever got the shaft, in my opinion it was poor Flo, the Supreme on the left. She should have been on top of the world, but at 32 she was dead from heart failure. More like a broken heart.

Florence, Diana Ross and Mary Wilson grew up in the now demolished Brewster Projects of Detroit. See them then and now. To make a very long story short, after begging Motown Records founder Berry Gordy for work, they were hired to sing. They recorded a string of hits at the Motown Studios, which still stand as a museum on East Grand Boulevard in Detroit. They recorded most of their hits including "Where Did Our Love Go," and "Baby Love," in Studio A. When the big money started rolling in, all 3 girls bought houses on Buena Vista, in Detroit. Flo's was #3767.

The popular story is that Flo had the better singing voice, but Gordy had his eyes on Miss Ross thus giving her more attention, and eventually changing the name of the group to "Diana Ross and the Supremes." Flo was a proud girl, and resented the attention heaped on Diana. She started drinking (who wouldn't?) and showed up to gigs drunk and late. Motown fired her and replaced her with Cindy Birdsong.

Flo signed away all her rights to "The Supremes" for $139.804.94 in 1968, in a hush hush meeting in "The Northland Inn." She married Motown chauffeur Tommy Chapman. See Flo and Tommy in front of the Buena Vista house. In 1971, Flo sued Motown for $8.7 million for what she claimed were back royalties, and because Gordy, "secretly, subversively and maliciously plotted and planned" to oust her from the group. She thought the initial settlement was "meager and grossly inadequate." The judge thought otherwise, and it was thrown out of court.

Tommy Chapman was going to manage her career from then on, but he was inexperienced. The money from the settlement was gone, and she and Tommy separated. Flo lost her house on Buena Vista, and she and their 3 children ended up on welfare.

In the fall of 1975 she came in to some money from some sort of "legal settlement," (supposedly a "slip and fall") and bought a house at 17701 Shaftsbury St. in Detroit. She got back together with Tommy, and things were starting to look up.

She entered Mt. Carmel Mercy Hospital (now a division of Grace Hospital) on Saturday Feb 21, 1976, complaining of numbness in her extremities. A police report said she had "ingested an unknown amount of pills and consumed alcohol." A doctor confirmed that "they were medication for overweight and high blood pressure." She died at 10:05 the next morning, the result of a blood clot in coronary artery.

Flo was laid out in the Stinson Funeral Home on West Grand Boulevard. She was put in a light blue steel coffin, and wore a light blue choir robe. Gladys Knight and Diana Ross sent flowers. She had the florist sign the sentiment, "I love you Blondie - Diana." Yeah right.

On Friday Feb 27^th, almost 5000 people lined the street in front of the New Bethel Baptist Church to say goodbye to her. Diana Ross arrived, and was booed by the crowd. The Reverend C.L. Franklin (Aretha's dad) presided over the service. Members of the Four Tops, Marvin Johnson and Thearon Hill served as pallbearers. Stevie Wonder was an honorary (insert obvious joke here) one. Diana made her grand entrance and sat in the front row with the immediate family. No one had the nerve to tell her to piss off. To quote the Detroit Free Press, "Ms. Ross's eyes filled with tears and the photographers snapped her picture." Then she embarrassed Mary Wilson, the other Supreme, by announcing they wanted a quiet moment with Flo, in front of all the mourners. When they took the casket out, the organist played "Someday, We'll Be Together." A nice touch, but neither Flo nor Mary sang on that particular record. How shitty is that?

When they left the church, the crowd went nuts, grabbing for the flowers off the casket. 32 Detroit Policemen barely had the crowd under control. "A funeral home attendant used the base of one of the arrangements as a spear, thrusting at persons in an attempt to keep them from grabbing the flowers. Finally, in frustration, he and the other attendants gave up and the whole arrangements were passed into the crowd, where people madly grabbed for bits and pieces.

At Detroit Memorial Park, there were no cameras, no reporters, and no Diana Ross. The only ones that went the whole 9 yards were Flo's family, Mary Wilson, and the pallbearers. They said a quiet goodbye, Flo was lowered into the ground, and they left.

Update: Even now, Motown continues to whore the original "Supremes," with a new group of gals.

Diana Ross admitted to mental ward
Friday February 22, 2002

Music legend Diana Ross -- on the verge of nervous collapse over her
faltering career and failed marriage -- secretly checked into a mental ward
in mid-December.

But the shattered star made an amazing recovery thanks to her two grown
daughters, who saw to it that she got professional help before she suffered
a full-blown mental and emotional collapse.

The issue that is on sale now reveals the drama of Diana's hospitalization,
her tragic downslide over the past few years . . . and more.

The settlement from a "slip and fall" you'd mentioned was actually a second settlement from Motown / Berry Gordy as stated in "Call Her Miss Ross", an unauthorized biography of the skank two drinks away from being on your website.

Thanks, Christopher!