 Redding was born in Dawson, Georgia, U.S., the fourth of six children, and the first son, of Otis Redding, Sr., and Fannie Roseman.Redding senior was a sharecropper and then worked at Robins Air Force Base, near Macon, and occasionally preached in local churches.When Otis was three the family moved to Tindall Heights, a predominantly African-American public housing project in Macon.