California Gov. Jerry Brown leaves office Jan. 7 after a political career that spanned nearly 50 years. Here's a look at key moments in the life of the state's longest-serving governor :
— 1938: Edmund Gerald Brown Jr., known as Jerry, is born in San Francisco to Bernice Brown and Edmund Gerald Brown Sr., known as Pat Brown.
— 1955: Jerry Brown graduates from St. Ignatius High School in San Francisco.
— 1956: Jerry Brown enrolls at the Jesuit seminary Sacred Heart Novitiate in Los Gatos and plans to become a Catholic priest.
— 1959: Pat Brown, a Democrat, is elected governor of California.
— 1960-61: Jerry Brown, instead of becoming a priest, attends the University of California-Berkeley and graduates with a degree in Classics.
— 1964: Jerry Brown graduates from Yale Law School and goes on to work at a Los Angeles law firm.
— 1966: Pat Brown loses his run for a third term as governor to Republican Ronald Reagan.
— 1969: Jerry Brown wins his first political race, becoming a trustee for the Los Angeles Community College District.
— 1970: Jerry Brown is elected secretary of state on a transparency platform and helped create California's campaign ethics watchdog through a 1974 ballot measure.
— 1974: Jerry Brown, a Democrat, wins the governorship against Republican Houston Flournoy, the state treasurer, after Reagan decided not to seek a third term. At 36, Brown is California's youngest governor in more than a century.
— 1976: Jerry Brown announces run for president but loses the Democratic nomination to Jimmy Carter.
— 1978: Jerry Brown is elected to a second term as California governor; voters pass Proposition 13, a ballot measure that radically reshapes California's tax system.
— 1980: Jerry Brown again runs for president, but his challenge to Carter is disrupted by Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy.
— 1982: Jerry Brown runs for U.S. Senate but loses to Republican Pete Wilson, the San Diego mayor who later becomes governor.
— 1983: Jerry Brown's second term as governor ends.
— 1983-1988: Jerry Brown is out of public office, traveling to Japan to study Zen Buddhism and India to work with Mother Theresa.
— 1988-1991: Jerry Brown serves as chairman of the California Democratic Party.
— 1992: Jerry Brown runs for president a third time, losing the Democratic nomination to Bill Clinton in a bitter campaign.
— 1995: Jerry Brown begins dating Anne Gust, a Gap executive.
— 1998: Brown is elected mayor of Oakland.
— 2005: Jerry Brown and Anne Gust are married in a ceremony officiated by Democratic U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein.
— 2006: Brown is elected attorney general of California, a job his father held before becoming governor.
— 2010: Brown is re-elected as California governor, defeating Republican Meg Whitman to win a third term. He surpasses Earl Warren's record as the longest-serving California governor.
— 2014: Brown wins a fourth term as California governor.
— Jan. 7, 2019: Jerry Brown, 80, will leave office as California's longest-serving and oldest governor.
