Hattie McDaniel was born in Wichita, Kansas, the youngest of thirteen children born to formerly enslaved parents.
Hattie McDaniel was born on June 10, 1893, in Wichita, Kansas, though some sources place her birth in 1895. She was the youngest of thirteen children born to Henry McDaniel, a Baptist minister and Civil War veteran who had served in the United States Colored Troops, and Susan Holbert, a gospel singer.
Her family moved frequently in her early years, eventually settling in Denver, Colorado, where Hattie grew up in a household steeped in music and performance. Her parents' background as formerly enslaved people shaped her understanding of the racial barriers she would spend her career navigating and, in many cases, breaking.
From a young age, McDaniel displayed a talent for singing, dancing, and comedic performance, often entertaining her family and community. She began performing publicly in her teens, joining her father's traveling minstrel show and honing the skills that would eventually make her one of the most recognizable Black performers in American entertainment history.
Her humble beginnings in a family that had directly experienced slavery, combined with the Jim Crow era into which she was born, make her later achievements — including becoming the first African American to win an Academy Award — all the more historically significant.