Early Life, Education, and Career
Brown was born in San Francisco, California, as the only son of four siblings born to Bernice Layne Brown, and District Attorney of San Francisco and later Governor of California, Edmund G. "Pat" Brown, Sr. Jerry Brown is Irish through his paternal grandfather and German through his paternal grandmother. He was a member of the California Cadet Corps at St. Ignatius High School, where he graduated in 1955.
In 1955, Brown entered Santa Clara University for a year, and left to attend Sacred Heart Novitiate, a Jesuit seminary, intent on becoming a Catholic priest. However, Brown left the seminary after a year and entered University of California, Berkeley, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in 1961. Brown went on to Yale Law School and graduated with a Juris Doctor in 1964. After law school, Brown worked as a law clerk for California Supreme Court Justice Mathew Tobriner. Brown later went to study in Mexico and Latin America.
Returning to California, Brown took the state bar exam and passed on his second attempt. Brown then settled in Los Angeles and joined the law firm of Tuttle & Taylor. In 1969, Brown ran for the newly created Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees, which oversaw community colleges in the city, and placed first in a field of 124.
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