LL Cool J's "Devastating" Family Revelation | Ancestry®

I mean even on my second album cover I'm on the back of my album cover punching a heavy bag I mean it is uncanny it really totally uncanny musician LL Cool J was raised in large part by his mother's parents Ellen and Eugene Griffith but when We examined ll's mother's DNA we saw that Eugene was not her biological father meaning that the man who played such a large role in ll's childhood was not his biological grandfather it was such a shocking discovery that we decided it just wouldn't be right to surprise LL coj with it so I called him before our interview to let him know in private away from the TV cameras what was it like for you to find this out it's a little devastating to know that you know that guy that raised me that was so kind to me wasn't my blood you know my mother put it in a really succinct way or she said it was uh the end of one chapter of my life as I know it in the beginning of a new One MH We Now set out to discover the identity of ll's biological grandfather the process was painstaking our genetic genealogist CC Moore compared ll's mother's DNA to millions of other DNA profiles in publicly available databases and M the family trees of every close match which eventually led us to an amazing find that's your mother's DNA compared to the DNA of a woman named Claudia Lewis and the DNA that they shared is highlighted in red and can you see how much red there is it's a lot of red man your mother and Claudia Shar 24.7% of their DNA they are without a doubt half siblings [Music] wow Claudia Lewis Claudia Lewis Claudia Lewis is the daughter of Nathaniel Christy Lewis wow that means that your mother's biological father was a man named Nathaniel chrisy Lewis he is your biological grandfather yeah that's that's that's That's Heavy I mean you know you could have you couldn't have told me in a thousand years and a million years that this was the case in my life now that we'd identified ll's grandfather we could begin to research his story and it wasn't long before we found his name all over the newspapers it turns out that from a very young age Nathaniel Christy Lewis and his brother John Henry Lewis were famous athletes and remarkably they excelled at a sport that LL has always loved boxing before his fourth year was over John Henry and Christy were diligently engaged in learning to box the two boys proved to be a sensation their services as juvenile fistic Showman we're in great demand man I mean you know I'm such a boxing fan my mother's a boxing fan my mother love boxing you know I mean even on my second album cover I'm on the back of my album cover punching a heavy bag I mean it is uncanny it really totally uncanny I mean it's I I you know it makes you wonder if your DNA carries Shadows or or or Consciousness yeah things that are cated it's in there man wow there's a sense of Pride from that sure maybe 100 years from now there'll be kids that are of my lineage M and they'll feel as proud as I do genetic genealogy is a revelatory tool allowing us to break through genealogical brick walls to recover long-lost ancestors who had disappeared from the paper trail to see more Incredible family history stories click here and thank you for watching

Channel: Ancestry

Views: 209,069

Keywords: ancestrydna, ancestry, finding your roots, family tree now, family tree, ancestors, family search, dna discovery, dna tests, dna test kits, dna analysis, ancestry com, family connections, ancestry.com, family history, heritage, history, family, adoption stories, relatives, family members, 23andme, myheritage, findmypast, descendants, family reunions, celebrity ancestry, famous ancestry, ll cool j, rapper, rap, reveal, ancestry dna results, ancestrydna family tree, ll cool j im bad

Id: eh8G4ep1HnU

Length: 4min 29sec (269 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 16 2024