fill the void in her life- finding out who her White father was. She’d never even seen her birth certificate until she was in her 70’s. Here’s what Daily Mail and Eartha Kitt’s daughter, Kitt Shapiro, revealed about the lifelong heartache Eartha Kitt experienced throughout her quest to feel whole:

After dance school, Kitt sought to make a solo career for herself and Britain became a second home for her and her daughter. It was only when Kitt was invited to give a speech at Benedict College in Columbia, South Carolina, in 1997 that the singer managed to come to terms with her original home.

During that same speech an attendee asked Kitt about her past and about her parents, as she was from that part of town. Kitt then confessed she had tried to find her birth certificate in the 50s, but had no luck. This re-ignited Kitt’s curiosity about herself.

After some digging around, a piece of information led her back down to the South. In the next seven months, Kitt and [her daughter] Kitt Shapiro hired a lawyer and started a petition to get the court to open her records. They finally allowed Kitt to see them, but…