They got a recording contract with Vee-Jay records in 1961 and their first release, Every Beat of My Heart, made the Billboard top 10 and followed it with Letter Full of Tears which reached number 19 then in 1964 they were signed to Larry Maxwell’s small Maxx label. In 1962 George left and they remained as a family quartet from here on in.
In 1959 Brenda and Eleanor left and were replaced by yet another cousin Edward Patten and mutual friend Langston George and began to tour locally. There was another cousin James Woods who was known by his nickname ‘Pip’ and it was decided to use that moniker for their group name. Within a year she got together with her sister Brenda, her brother Merald, known as Bubba and cousins William and Elenor Guest to form a family vocal group. Gladys was born in 1944 in Oglethorpe, Georgia and had her first taste of fame at the age of seven when she won Ted Mack’s Original Amateur Hour TV and $2000 by singing a cover of Nat King Cole’s Too Young.
Edwin only managed the top 10 once at the end of his Motown days when, in 1970, War, a cover of an older Temptations song, reached number two, but when he switched to the 20th Century label in the latter seventies, he had back to back top ten’s with Contact and H.A.P.P.Y. Gladys never managed a UK top 10 hit until she moved to Buddah records in 1973 and then scored with The Way We Were/Try To Remember (medley) and Best Thing That Ever Happened To Me. Edwin Starr and Gladys Knight & The Pips were two original Motown acts who later found greater fame in the disco days and, in some ways, are best remembered for that era.
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