Voletta Wallace, the mother of Christopher George Latore Wallace, better known by his stage name the Notorious B.I.G., has died in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania at the age of 72. She had been in hospice care and reportedly died of natural causes on the morning of Feb. 21, according to Monroe County Coroner Thomas Yanac.
A native of Trelawny, Jamaica, she emigrated to the United States where she met fellow countryman Selwyn George Latore. They produced a son Christopher Wallace, who was born at the Cumberland Hospital in 1972 in Brooklyn, N.Y. A schoolteacher and very religious, she tried to shield him from the Bedford–Stuyvesant influences which surrounded his environment, but the former honor student eventually succumbed to the drug-dealing and other Illicit activities endemic to the area. Alternating between law-breaking and the emerging rap genre of the streets, Christopher Wallace eventually ventured into performing, first adopting the moniker “Biggie Smalls” from a character in the blaxploitation movie “Let’s Do It Again,” and then settling on the nickname the “Notorious B.I.G.,” which reportedly stood for “Business Instead of Game.”
Through the guidance of music impresario Sean “Diddy” Combs, Notorious B.I.G. climbed the Billboard charts, and generating millions in revenue.
Initially dismissive of her son’s creative output that made him a household name, she called his music “noise.” Voletta Wallace also claimed ignorance of the deplorable behavior that hatched his music and thrust her son into the public eye.
“I remembered my son said, ‘Don’t listen to my music.’ And I never listened to his music,” she said in an Associated Press interview.
“What he was doing out there, maybe I should have known. But honestly, I didn’t. And to this day, there are people who are saying, ‘Oh, she knew. (whispers) But I never knew.”
Upon his still unsolved murder by gunshot in 1997, his mother assumed control of his estate, and in tandem with his ex-wife Faith Evans, has nurtured it from an estimated $10 million to a respectable $160 million. These assets continue to grow through ongoing litigation initiated by the unauthorized use of the rapper’s likeness by mega-retailers such as Bed Bath & Beyond, Home Depot, Nordstrom, and Target.
Voletta Wallace is survived by a granddaughter T’yanna Wallace, and her grandson Christopher Jordan Wallace.