Jabarkan Awal kehidupan dari Lady Bird Johnson

Claudia Alta Taylor lahir pada 22 Desember 1912 di Karnack, Texas, sebuah kota di Kabupaten Harrison, dekat garis negara bagian timur dengan Louisiana. Her birthplace was "The Brick House," an antebellum plantation house on the outskirts of town, which her father had purchased shortly before her birth. She was a descendant of English Protestant martyr Rowland Taylor through his grandson Captain Thomas J. Taylor II.

She was named for her mother's brother Claud.

During her infancy, her nursemaid, Alice Tittle,

said that she was as "purty as a ladybird."

Opinions differ about whether the name refers to a bird or a ladybird beetle, the latter of which is commonly referred to as a "ladybug" in North America. The nickname virtually replaced her first name for the rest of her life. Her father and siblings called her Lady,

and her husband called her Bird—the name she used on her marriage license. During her teenage years, some classmates would call her Bird to provoke her, since she reportedly was not fond of the name.

Nearly all of her maternal and paternal immigrant ancestors arrived in the Virginia Colony during the late 17th and early 18th centuries, likely as indentured servants as were most early settlers in the colony. Her father, a native of Alabama, had primarily English ancestry, and some Welsh and Danish. Her mother, also a native of Alabama, was of English and Scottish descent.

Her father, Thomas Jefferson Taylor (August 29, 1874 – October 22, 1960), was a sharecropper's son. He became a wealthy businessman, and owned  of cotton and two general stores. "My father was a very strong character, to put it mildly," his daughter once said. "He lived by his own rules. It was a whole feudal way of life, really."

Her mother, born Minnie Lee Pattillo (1874–1918), loved opera and felt out of place in Karnack; she was often in "poor emotional and physical health." When Lady Bird was five years old, Minnie fell down a flight of stairs while pregnant and died of complications of miscarriage. In a profile of Lady Bird Johnson, Time magazine described Lady Bird's mother as "a tall, eccentric woman from an old and aristocratic Alabama family, [who] liked to wear long white dresses and heavy veils [... and who] scandalized people for miles around by entertaining Negroes in her home, and once even started to write a book about Negro religious practices, called Bio Baptism." Suaminya, bagaimanapun, cenderung melihat orang kulit hitam sebagai tidak lebih dari "penebang kayu dan laci air," menurut putranya yang lebih muda Anthony.

Lady Bird memiliki dua kakak laki-laki, Thomas Jefferson Jr (1901–1959) dan Antonio, juga dikenal sebagai Tony (1904–1986). Ayahnya yang janda menikah dua kali lagi. Istri keduanya adalah Beulah Taylor, seorang pemegang buku di sebuah toko umum. Istri ketiganya adalah Ruth Scroggins, yang dinikahinya pada tahun 1937.

Lady Bird sebagian besar dibesarkan oleh bibinya ibu Effie Pattillo, yang pindah ke Karnack setelah kematian saudara perempuannya. Dia juga mengunjungi kerabat Pattillo di Autauga County, Alabama, setiap musim panas sampai dia menjadi seorang wanita muda. Ketika dia menjelaskan, "Sampai saya berusia sekitar 20 tahun, musim panas selalu berarti Alabama bagi saya. Dengan Bibi Effie kami akan naik kereta di Marshall dan naik ke bagian dunia yang berarti potongan semangka, piknik di sungai, dan banyak perusahaan setiap hari Minggu." According to Lady Bird, her Aunt Effie "opened my spirit to beauty, but she neglected to give me any insight into the practical matters a girl should know about, such as how to dress or choose one's friends or learning to dance."

Lady Bird adalah seorang gadis pemalu dan pendiam yang menghabiskan banyak masa mudanya sendirian di luar rumah. "Orang-orang selalu melihat ke belakang sekarang dan menganggapnya sepi," dia pernah berkata tentang masa kecilnya. "Bagi saya itu jelas bukan ... Saya menghabiskan banyak waktu hanya berjalan dan memancing dan berenang." She developed her lifelong love of the outdoors as a child growing up in the tall pines and bayous of East Texas, where she watched the wildflowers bloom each spring.