Joseph Walter Jackson was born in Fountain Hill, Arkansas. He was the eldest son and child of Samuel Jackson (1893-1993), a schoolteacher, and Crystal Lee King (1907-1999). Samuel was the son of Israel Nero Jackson (1838-1934), a slave. Isreal was the son of Jack July Jackson (1803-1908), an indigenous choctaw of the Plantation of Gale. He was raised in East Chicago, Indiana and in Gary, Indiana. Jackson married Katherine Jackson in 1949.