Patti Smith reveals in new memoir how she learned who her biological father was

"For years after a 2012 DNA test revealed that she and her sister, Linda, were but half-siblings, the two assumed what their maternal grandmother had long suspected that Smith had actually been fathered by her mother's uncle, she writes in Bread of Angels, published by Random House. However, when they took an autosomal DNA test to go deeper into her mother's side of the family, the half-sisters discovered that Smith's father was 100% Ashkenazi, Smith recounts of the results that arrived on her 70th birthday."

"What followed was almost just as surprising. Smith had put a daughter up for adoption when she was 20, and they'd since been reunited embraced into our fold thanks to that daughter's sleuthing in search of her biological mother. Those skills proved invaluable as Smith sought her own progenitor. The daughter whose privacy Smith fiercely protects, per her wishes helped her locate a photo of her father, Sidney. She learned that he was a handsome Jewish pilot with dark wavy hair and had died in 1965."

"The jarring revelations held up Smith's book for a couple of years while she processed the information and assimilated it into her life story, which she felt had been recast, the Horses singer writes. I never saw it coming, Smith, who will turn 79 in December, told CBS News of the discovery. She debated whether to disclose the information in her book, but in the end she wanted to honor Sidney for making her possible and help those who may be making similar discoveries."

Patti Smith did not know her biological father's identity until recent DNA testing and family sleuthing revealed new ancestry details. A 2012 test showed she and her sister were half-siblings, prompting family theories about her paternity. A later autosomal test showed her father was entirely Ashkenazi, with results arriving on her 70th birthday. A daughter Smith had placed for adoption decades earlier helped locate a photograph and identify the father as Sidney, a Jewish pilot who died in 1965. The revelations required years of processing, and Smith chose to disclose them to honor Sidney.

Read at www.mercurynews.com