How many children did Duke Ellington have?
One. On July 2, 1918, Duke married a high school sweetheart, Edna Thompson; their only child, Mercer Kennedy Ellington, was born on March 11, 1919. Mercer played the trumpet and also served as band manager for the Duke Ellington Orchestra. After his father’s death, Mercer carried on his father’s legacy and conducted the Duke Ellington Orchestra until his own death in 1996. Who were Duke’s parents? His father J.E. (James Edward) and his mother Daisy Kennedy Ellington raised “Edward” in a middle-class home in the Northwest section of Washington, D.C. Duke was especially devoted to his mother and in 1969, thirty-four years after her death, Ellington accepted the Presidential Medal of Freedom with these words, “There is nowhere else I would rather be tonight but in my mother’s arms.” Did Duke have brothers and sisters? One sister, Ruth Ellington Boatwright, who was sixteen years younger. Mrs. Boatwright currently resides in New York City. Where did the materials in the Ellington Collection
