Yellen was born on August 13, 1946,[4] to a family of Polish Jewish[5] ancestry in the Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, neighborhood of New York City, and grew up there.[6] Her mother was Anna Ruth (née Blumenthal; 1907–1986), an elementary school teacher who gave up her teaching job to become a stay-at-home mother. Her father was Julius Yellen (1906–1975), a family physician who worked from the ground floor of their house. Janet has an older brother, John (born 1942), who is a program director for archaeology at the National Science Foundation.[7][8]