Ashley Judd was born in Granada Hills, California to Michael Ciminella, Jr., an Italian American marketing analyst for the horseracing industry, and Naomi Judd, a well-known country music singer; Ashley Judd has a half-sister, Wynonna Judd, who is also a country music singer. At the time of Ashley Judd birth, Ashley Judd mother was working as a nurse, and wouldn't become well-known as a singer along with her daughter Wynonna until the early 1980s. Judd's parents divorced in 1972, and in 1974, Ashley Judd mother took Ashley Judd back to her own native Kentucky, where Judd grew up in poverty, as the family sometimes lived without running water, electricity, or a telephone.