DAY IN HISTORY-JUNE 7, 1958

Berry Gordy Jr. Starts Tamla Records

Record label leads to creation of Motown, aka “Hitsville U.S.A.”

Early Tamla Record labels. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Born in Detroit as one of eight children, Berry Gordy Jr. dropped out of high school to launch a professional boxing career in the late 1940s. Returning from the Korean War after a stint in the U.S. Army, Gordy took a keen interest in music.

Gordy found he was good at writing songs; when he hooked up with Jackie Wilson, he wrote or co-wrote hits for the Black musical artist, among them, the smash hit, “Lonely Teardrops.” Wilson’s version of the song reached #1 on the Billboard R&B chart.

But Gordy wanted more — he dreamt of starting his own record label. In 1957, he came across a vocal group at first called the Matadors and later renamed the Miracles. The group’s lead singer, Bill “Smokey” Robinson, encouraged Gordy to start a label. Gordy took an $800 loan from his family and on June 7, 1958, he founded Tamla Records.

Gordy signed Smokey Robinson and the Miracles and added to his early stable of artists, signing Marvin Gaye, Mary Wells and Stevie Wonder. He eventually expanded Tamla to include another label he called Motown in honor of his hometown Detroit, the “Motor City.” In 1960, he transformed his growing business into Motown Record Corporation. He named his first recording studio and company headquarters “Hitsville U.S.A.” It was located in a converted photographer’s studio at 2648 West Grand Boulevard in Detroit.

Over the next decade, the “Motown sound” took popular music by storm. In addition to those artists mentioned above, others like the Four Tops, the Jackson 5, Martha and the Vandellas, the Supremes and the Temptations recorded and released over 100 Top Ten hits. Thanks to Berry Gordy’s vision, Motown was instrumental in producing Black music embraced by Black and white audiences alike.

Motown was unquestionably highly influential in shaping the modern music industry — and it all started with a songwriter from Detroit who had a big dream.

Today, thanks largely to Berry Gordy’s Motown, the city is experiencing a music renaissance. The original “Hitsville U.S.A.” headquarters, now the Motown Museum, is being expanded, according to the Museum:

The culmination of years of planning, hard work, and generous contributions from dedicated donors, the highly anticipated, multi-phase, $75 million Motown Museum expansion — the heart of which is called Hitsville NEXT — will grow the museum campus to a 50,000-square-foot world-class entertainment and education tourist destination.

That expansion, along with multiple music venues throughout Detroit as well as music festivals, is contributing to Detroit’s rebirth as a music destination.

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