The rapper and record executive known today as Birdman was born Bryan Christopher Brooks on February 15th, 1969 at Charity Hospital in New Orleans, Louisiana. Due to his father, Johnnie Williams, not signing his son’s birth certificate, Bryan would adopt his mother Gladys’ surname of Brooks. Far more unusual than that however, was the fact that for the first 30-days of his life, Bryan wasn’t given a first name at all and was simply referred to as “Baby” by those closest to him -- a nickname he would continue to use well into his adult life. As a kid, Bryan and his family lived on top of a bar that his father owned. Unfortunately, his mother was struck down by illness in 1975 when he was only five. After this tragic turn of events, Bryan and his three siblings, Kim, Ronald, and Ray were taken in by their Uncle and spent the next two years living in Prince George, British Columbia – a fast growing logging town that was on its way to becoming the second largest city in the province and one with more millionaires per capita than anywhere else in Canada.