44th

Barack Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, on August 4, 1961. His mother was Stanley Ann Dunham, called Ann. She met Barack Obama’s father, Barack Obama Sr., while she was taking a Russian language class at the University of Hawaii. Barack Sr. was of Luo ancestry. He had grown up herding goats in Kenya, but he earned a scholarship to the University of Hawaii. They married in 1961. Interracial marriage was illegal in most states in 1961.

Ann dropped out of college to care for Barack Jr. His father was accepted to a PhD program at Harvard University. Barack’s parents divorced in 1964, and Ann returned to the university. As a single parent, she finished her degree in anthropology. She spent the next 20 years completing her PhD.

Barack moved to Indonesia when he was six. He moved back to Hawaii to live with his grandparents at the age of 10. For grades 5-12, he went to Punahou School and graduated with honors in 1979. Obama wrote about growing up in Hawaii: “The opportunity that Hawaii offered—to experience a variety of cultures in a climate of mutual respect—became an integral part of my world view, and a basis for the values that I hold most dear.”

With the help of scholarships and student loans, he went to Occidental College in Los Angeles from 1979–1981, and then Columbia University in New York. He majored in political science, specializing in international relations.

In 1988 Barack was accepted to Harvard Law School. He was the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. When he finished law school, he went back to Chicago where he was an attorney for victims of housing and employment discrimination. He also taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School and married Michelle Robinson. They had met while he had a summer internship at a law firm. She was an attorney there who was asked to be his adviser. They were married in 1992 and had two daughters: Malia and Sasha.

In 1996, he was elected to the Illinois State Senate. His district included both the area around the University of Chicago and some of the poorest areas on the South Side of Chicago. He helped pass ethics reform, cut taxes for working families, expanded health care services,

Barack Obama

and increased funding for early childhood education programs for the poor.

In the 2004, he became known nationally when he gave a speech in support of John Kerry at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. In 2004, Barack Obama became the third African-American elected to the US Senate since Reconstruction. He created a website to track federal spending, helped pass lobbying reform, provided funding to lock up and destroy weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union, and pushed for alternative energy development and for improved benefits for veterans.

In 2008, he defeated Hillary Clinton to become the Democratic candidate for president and defeated the Republican candidate, John McCain, to become the 44th President of the United States. He was the first African-American president.