Florence Ballard heart attack in February 1976 at the age of 32. Ballard's death was considered by one critic as "one of rock's greatest tragedies". Ballard was posthumously inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Supremes in 1988. Florence Glenda Ballard was born in Detroit, Michigan on June 30, 1943 to Lurlee (née Wilson) and Jesse Ballard, as the ninth of fifteen children. Her siblings were Bertie, Cornell, Jesse, Jr., Gilbert, Geraldine, Barbara, Maxine, Billy, Calvin, Pat, Linda and Roy. Her mother was a resident of Rosetta, Mississippi. Her father was born Jesse Lambert in
Donald E. Ballard Donald E. Ballard Donald Everett Ballard (born December 5, 1945) is a retired American colonel in the Kansas National Guard and former member of the United States Navy, in which he was a hospital corpsman in the Vietnam War and received the Medal of Honor for heroic actions above and beyond the call of duty on May 16, 1968. Ballard was born in Kansas City, Missouri. He was married and was working in a dental lab when he decided to join the Navy in hopes of becoming a dentist someday. He enlisted in the United States Navy in 1965. After