Janet Condra: Mother of Corrie Bird and Former Wife of Larry Bird

Janet Condra’s name appears most often at the margins of a very public story: the rise of Larry Bird from small-town Indiana to NBA legend. Yet her life touches two threads that still interest readers today—Bird’s earliest years as a young husband and father, and the quieter, steadier world that formed around their daughter, Corrie Bird. What follows gathers what can be stated with confidence from trustworthy records, makes clear where information is scarce, and resists the rumor-mill that often swirls around private people connected to famous ones.

A small-town beginning

The most reliable sketches place both Larry Bird and Janet Condra in the same small southern-Indiana orbit—French Lick and nearby West Baden Springs—where they came of age and attended Springs Valley High School. Contemporary write-ups about Bird’s youth emphasize the tight-knit setting and the ordinary routines of school, family, and early jobs that shaped him. In that setting, he and Condra knew one another before professional sports and national attention entered the picture.

A brief marriage

The core facts about Janet Condra’s public story are straightforward and well-documented: she married Larry Bird in 1975, and the marriage ended in less than a year. Multiple reliable summaries of Bird’s life list the marriage and its brief duration exactly in those terms. This is the portion of Condra’s life that enters the public record because of Bird’s fame, and it remains consistent across serious sources.

Corrie Bird’s birth

After the marriage ended, there was an attempt at reconciliation. Out of that chapter came the birth of Corrie Bird in 1977. This is also a matter of record in dependable reference entries on Bird’s life and in mainstream features that summarize his family. While these sources center on Larry Bird, they establish the essential facts about Corrie’s parentage and timing, placing Janet Condra clearly and permanently in the story as Corrie’s mother.

Life outside the spotlight

Here is where the trail grows quiet—and that silence matters. Credible outlets agree on a simple truth: Janet Condra has kept a low public profile since the late 1970s. There is no steady record of interviews, photo spreads, or detailed profiles from major newspapers and magazines about her later life, work, or private family details. Reputable backgrounders on Bird tend to mention her respectfully and briefly, then move on to the public contours of his career. In other words, the absence of detail is not a gap to be filled with guesswork; it reflects a person’s deliberate choice to live privately.

About those “extra” details

If you search the web today, you’ll find pages that claim heights, weights, specific birthdays, siblings, second marriages, jobs, and net-worth figures for Janet Condra. Most of those claims trace to small, low-editorial-standards sites that repeat one another without citing public records or first-hand reporting. Responsible biographies avoid repeating those specifics because they aren’t supported by primary sources or by established journalism. For a figure whose fame is purely adjacent—famous by association, not by self-chosen public life—that distinction is important. The reliable, mainstream sources stay within what can be verified and leave the rest alone.

What we can say—carefully and clearly

What can be said, then, with confidence? That Condra and Bird were young Hoosiers whose lives intersected in the most consequential way for them both. That they married in 1975, separated within a year, and—after a brief reconciliation—welcomed their daughter, Corrie, in 1977. That Condra did not pursue publicity, and that reliable public sources have respected that boundary by keeping their coverage to the basics. Those points are not speculative; they are the durable elements repeated by vetted references and mainstream features.

Corrie Bird’s thread in the story

Corrie’s presence links these worlds. Mainstream coverage of Larry Bird’s later life notes her as his daughter from his first marriage, and it occasionally touches—delicately—on the complexities that can follow when young marriages end and fame arrives swiftly. Again, serious outlets summarize rather than sensationalize, anchoring on the facts of Corrie’s birth and parentage and the basic family framework that followed. The point is not to inflate personal drama but to note the lived reality that a brief marriage can nonetheless shape family trajectories for decades.

How public memory works

In sports history, certain names become shorthand—Magic and Bird, Jordan and Pippen—and those names cast long shadows. People near the spotlight can end up remembered indirectly, sometimes even inaccurately, because fans search for connective tissue that explains the star’s “origin story.” With Janet Condra, the ethical approach is to resist that pull. The temptation to “fill in” her life with invented detail is strong on the modern internet; the responsible path is to mark the boundary between documented fact and private life.

The Indiana setting matters

One reason this story stays rooted in memory is that it begins not in Boston Garden or the NBA Finals, but in southern Indiana, with its gymnasiums, gravel driveways, and long afternoons. Profiles of Bird’s youth make the place nearly a character of its own—French Lick, West Baden, and Springs Valley High—and by extension, that place is also part of Janet Condra’s story. The human texture comes from this setting: two teenagers growing up in the same small community, choosing marriage young, and then parting as their lives moved in very different directions. It’s a reminder that sports legends begin as local stories about neighbors, classmates, and families.

Why factual restraint is the right tone

A reader might ask: Why not include a definitive age, a list of siblings, or a catalog of jobs? The simple answer is that no high-quality public record provides those specifics for Janet Condra, and manufacturing precision would be misleading. Good biographical writing knows when to stop. When credible sources such as standard biographical references and established magazines keep to the essentials, it’s a signal: there isn’t more to say publicly—and that’s okay.

Larry Bird’s life moved back into view

After the marriage, Bird’s path is the one the public follows: the return to Indiana State, the fabled NBA run, and a long second act as coach and executive. Mainstream profiles that summarize his life reliably note that he later married Dinah Mattingly in 1989, and that Corrie is his daughter from the earlier marriage. These references—coming from outlets that regularly vet celebrity profiles—are useful context because they frame Condra’s place in the broader family picture without peering into her private affairs.

Reading between the lines without crossing them

From a human point of view, the outline invites empathy. Two very young people tried marriage; it didn’t last. They shared a child; life became complicated. One person chose public work on one of the largest stages in American sports; the other did not. That contrast is part of what keeps readers searching for “Janet Condra” today. But a humane article resists turning that curiosity into speculation. The dignified approach is to honor the known facts and leave the rest to the private sphere where Condra has chosen to live.

Reporting standards for private figures

There is also a practical point for bloggers and writers. When a person is not a public official, entertainer, or self-promoting figure, accuracy and restraint become even more important. In this case, the “anchor” facts—1975 marriage, 1976 separation, 1977 birth of Corrie—are echoed in reputable, updated references. Secondary details not found in such sources should be treated as unverified. That’s why this article relies on mainstream, well-edited materials for its scaffolding and avoids the lure of recycled trivia.

How to handle the rumor ecosystem

If you’ve encountered timelines that assign exact wedding days, claim specific occupations for Condra, or list physical attributes, check their footnotes. Often there are none—or they lead to a chain of small blogs citing one another. By contrast, when major outlets summarize Larry Bird’s personal life, they stick to verifiable markers and to the family relationships Bird has publicly acknowledged. That’s a good model for treating Janet Condra’s story with care.

A mother at the center

Regardless of public attention, one fact remains central: Janet Condra is Corrie Bird’s mother. That identity gives her story weight that isn’t measured in headlines. Readers who come to this topic because they love basketball often find themselves lingering on the ordinary, resonant parts: school events, carpools, first apartments, the hard choices that follow a divorce. Those are the spaces most of life actually happens. They don’t leave much for the record, but they leave a great deal for the people living them.

What careful readers should take away

For anyone writing or reading about figures adjacent to fame, the Condra example is a reminder to seek documented facts, to understand the limits of public information, and to respect the line between curiosity and intrusion. It’s entirely possible to tell a clear, informative story about Janet Condra without inventing the missing bricks. The right kind of biography is honest about what we know and equally honest about what we don’t.

Summary of verified facts

To close, here are the points supported by reliable sources:

• Janet Condra married Larry Bird in 1975; the marriage lasted less than a year.

• After an attempted reconciliation, they had a daughter, Corrie Bird, in 1977.

• Bird later married Dinah Mattingly in 1989; accounts of Bird’s family identify Corrie as his daughter from the earlier marriage.

• There is no confirmed public record from trustworthy outlets of Condra’s exact birth date, height, siblings, or later private life details; responsible profiles keep to the essentials.

A respectful ending

This is, ultimately, a story about a person who has chosen privacy while remaining connected to one of America’s most public sports narratives. Janet Condra appears at the decisive beginning of that story and—through her daughter, Corrie—remains part of it. Writing about her well means staying true to the facts, avoiding speculation, and recognizing that a quiet life can be meaningful without being cataloged online. That approach keeps the article informative, professional, and fair, and it leaves room for the humanity that biographies are meant to honor.

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