For other people named Janet Jackson, see Janet Jackson (disambiguation).
Janet Damita Jo Jackson (born May 16, 1966) is an African-American singer-songwriter, dancer, actress, and the youngest child of the famed Jackson music family. She is the sister of pop icon Michael Jackson. Breaking away from the shadows of her siblings, Jackson now ranks as the ninth most successful artist in the history of rock and roll, and is the youngest artist in the top ten of that group, according to Billboard magazine in 2004, and has gone to sell over 130 million albums and singles worldwide. Her high-octane choreography, music videos and pop appeal has influenced some of today's younger female singers.
Janet was born the last of nine children in Gary, Indiana to parents Joseph and Katherine Jackson. Living in a two-bedroom house with eight older siblings, Janet's father, Joseph, or Joe, worked as a crane operator in a steel mill and before she became a devout Jehovah's Witness, her mother Katherine worked as a store clerk for Sears. Before Janet's birth, her father decided to try a hand at a music career fronting the R&B band the Falcons, but never got as far as the top nightclubs in Indiana. According to reports, Janet's father was gregarious and stern while her mother was deeply religious and seemed saintly.
By the time she was a toddler, Janet's older brothers Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, Marlon and Michael had already begun to perform on stage at nightclubs and theaters as the Jackson 5. In March 1969, the group signed to Motown Records, and by the end of the year, the group recorded their first of their four consecutive number-one singles, " I Want You Back". By the time the Jackson 5 had achieved success when they became the first band to score their first four #1 singles, the entire family moved to Southern California, eventually settling in a gated mansion they named Hayvenhurst in 1971.