Early life and career
.mw-parser-output .stack{box-sizing:border-box}.mw-parser-output .stack>div{margin:1px;overflow:hidden}@media all and (min-width:720px){.mw-parser-output .stack-clear-left{float:left;clear:left}.mw-parser-output .stack-clear-right{float:right;clear:right}.mw-parser-output .stack-left{float:left}.mw-parser-output .stack-right{float:right}.mw-parser-output .stack-margin-clear-left{float:left;clear:left;margin-right:1em}.mw-parser-output .stack-margin-clear-right{float:right;clear:right;margin-left:1em}.mw-parser-output .stack-margin-left{float:left;margin-right:1em}.mw-parser-output .stack-margin-right{float:right;margin-left:1em}}  Clinton's birthplace home in Hope, Arkansas
Clinton in Hot Springs High School's 1963 yearbook
Clinton was born William Jefferson Blythe III on August 19, 1946, at Julia Chester Hospital in Hope, Arkansas.[2] He is the son of William Jefferson Blythe Jr., a traveling salesman who died in an automobile accident three months before his birth, and Virginia Dell Cassidy (later Virginia Kelley).[3] His parents had married on September 4, 1943, but this union later proved to be bigamous, as Blythe was still married to his fourth wife.[4] Virginia traveled to New Orleans to study nursing soon after Bill was born, leaving him in Hope with her parents Eldridge and Edith Cassidy, who owned and ran a small grocery store.[5] At a time when the southern United States was racially segregated, Clinton's grandparents sold goods on credit to people of all races.[5][6][7][8][9] In 1950, Bill's mother returned from nursing school and married Roger Clinton Sr., who co-owned an automobile dealership in Hot Springs, Arkansas, with his brother and Earl T. Ricks.