ABSTRACT
Early Life Cassius Marcellus Clay, Jr., was born in Louisville, Kentucky, on January 17, 1942, the son of Cassius Marcellus Clay, Sr., and Odessa Lee Grady Clay. His father was a commercial artist specializing in sign painting; he also painted murals for churches and taverns. His mother sometimes worked as a domestic for four dollars a day to help support the family. Some of the Clays trace their name to Ali's great-great-grandfather, who was a slave of Cassius Marcellus Clay, a relative of Henry Clay and ambassador to Russia in the 1860's.
