Henrietta Lacks was a black woman who grew up in Clover, Virginia (Zielinski). She was born in 1920 as Loretta Pleasant (Biography.com Editors), and was affectionately known as “Hennie” (Brown). She was raised by her grandfather and lived with her cousin, David Lacks (Biography.com Editors). Henrietta worked as a tobacco farmer along with her family (Zielinski), and she also sold tobacco at auctions (Brown). She attended school up until sixth grade (Brown). Henrietta and her cousin Lacks later got married and had a total of 5 children. She had her first child when she was only 14 years of age (Biography.com Editors). One of her daughters, by the name of Elsie, ended up living in the “Hospital for the Negro Insane” (Biography.com Editors). Elsie
