Ronald Wilson Reagan was born on February 6, 1911, in Tampico, Illinois to John Edward “Jack” Reagan and Nellie Wilson Reagan. Throughout his youth, Reagan’s family lived in a number of towns, eventually settling in Dixon, Illinois, in 1920, where Jack opened up a shoe store. There, Reagan finished out his education, participating in various activities such as sports, student government, and acting in school plays. In 1928, Reagan graduated from Dixon High School, and continued his education at Eureka College. He graduated in 1932 and moved to California in pursuit of a Hollywood career. Reagan worked as a radio sports announcer until a screen test won him a contract at Warner Brothers in 1937, where he worked for the next 15 years. Reagan married but divorced soon after; then in 1952, he married actress Nancy Davis and had two children, Patricia and Ronald Jr. Throughout their 52 year-long marriage, Nancy was Reagan’s highest supporter and advocate.…show more content… Brown, Sr., by nearly a million votes. Two years later, Reagan made a last-minute bid for the Republican presidential nomination and, when that failed, easily won the re-election for governor in 1970. Undeterred by his failure, Reagan ran again for the Republican presidential nomination in 1976 against President Gerald R. Ford, but did not make the cut at the August party convention. When Ford lost to Democrat Jimmy Carter in November at the elections, it cleared the way for conservatives like Reagan to initiate a combined effort to take over the Republican Party. Reagan arose as the GOP presidential choice in 1980 and picked one of his primary opponents, George H. W. Bush, as his vice-presidential running