Untold Truth of Kecalf Cunningham Aretha Franklins Son That Once Went To Jail

Kecalf Cunningham is the only son of Aretha L. Franklin and Ken E. Cunningham, an African American activist and road manager. He is currently 53 years old and is the youngest of Aretha L. Franklin’s four children. In October 2018, he went to jail for a DUI offence.

That offense invariably brought further scrutiny to the life of the celebrity son who’s a musician. This article explores the untold truth of Kecalf Cunningham’s life and the event that led to his spending time in jail.

Kecalf Cunningham was born on March 28, 1970, in the United States. He is an American citizen by birth and belongs to the African American ethnic group. His birth sign is Aries and he is currently 53 years old.

Kecalf is notable enough in his own right, but most of his identity has revolved around the fact that he is the youngest of the four children the late Aretha Franklin had while she was alive.

Kecalf’s mother needs little to no introduction, as she is often regarded as one of the greatest singers of all time, a reputation built on the more than six decades she was active as a singer as well as her many musical exploits which included the sale of over 75 million records worldwide. Those musical exploits also earned her the well-deserved nickname ‘Queen of Soul’.

The man with whom Aretha had Kecalf is none other than African American activist, Ken E. Cunningham. It’s been revealed that Kecalf’s name is an acronym for his parents’ full names, Ken E. Cunningham and Aretha Louise Franklin, and he is the only son the late Aretha had with Ken.

Compared to the career of his son’s mother, there is no doubt that Ken was less popular. However, several sources have confirmed that he played a very important role in the late singer’s career. He was her road manager and helped her stop certain lifestyle traits like drinking and smoking.

Somewhere along the line, the relationship between Kecalf’s parents changed from being professional to a more intimate and romantic one. According to close sources, their romance began in 1968 and lasted for about eight years before ending in 1976.

Despite the fact that their relationship lasted as long as Aretha’s first marriage, Kecalf’s parents were never married.

Having established the fact that Kecalf Cunningham is the only child of his parents, it is important to reassert the position that he is not the only child of his mother who was already a mother of three before he was born.

Kecalf’s oldest sibling, a half-brother named Clarence Franklin Jr. after his maternal grandfather, was born on January 28, 1955, when his mother was just 13 years old. From her handwritten wills discovered in 2019, she identified Edward Jordan as the father of her first son.

Kecalf’s mother was only 15 years old when she had his half-brother, Edward Derone Franklin, on August 31, 1957. His immediate older half-brother, Teddy White Jr., known professionally as Teddy Richards, was born in February 1964, and is the only one of his siblings who was born within the confines of the marital institution.

It is unclear what sort of relationship Kecalf has with his half-brothers, and that has left room for several speculations.

Kecalf Cunningham unsurprisingly earns a living in the music industry, just like his parents. However, it is important to point out the fact that he is more like his mother in that regard in that he is a singer and a songwriter.

He became well-known to the public after he featured alongside his mother at a Radio City Hall Concert in 2008. His performance confirmed what many had felt about him for years and put him in the limelight. He also shared the stage with his famous mother in 2017 during the unveiling ceremony of Aretha Franklin’s Way, a street named in her honor.

Other than sharing a stage with his mother, Kecalf has also done well as a solo gospel singer with songs of his own. He has also performed with his daughter, Victorie, who is just one of his children seeking to carry the torch of the Franklin legacy into the next generation.

According to several sources, Kecalf Cunningham has a net worth currently estimated to be around $22 million. However, it has been revealed that a sizable chunk of that net worth came from his late mother’s estate, a woman who reportedly had a net worth of over $80 million at the time of her death.

On October 27, 2018, Kecalf Cunningham was pulled over by law enforcement and subsequently arrested for driving under the influence (DUI). The Blast reported that the event took place just about a couple of months after the death of his mother, Aretha Franklin, who died of advanced pancreatic cancer of the neuroendocrine type at age 76.

The then 48-year-old man must have been struggling with the emotional upheaval brought on by the demise of his beloved mother but he was nonetheless arraigned before a judge on December 19, 2018, where he pleaded guilty to operating a motor vehicle under the influence of alcohol. He was subsequently sentenced to a maximum of 93 days in jail, and after serving the allotted time, he was released on February 26, 2019.

Kecalf Cunningham is a happily married man. He is married to Kafi Franklin and they reportedly have six children together – five daughters and a son- including Victorie, Jordan, and Gracie Franklin.