Bruce Lee was born on November 27, 1940, at the Chinese Hospital, in San Francisco's Chinatown. According to the Chinese zodiac, Lee was born in both the hour and the year of the Dragon, which according to tradition is a strong and fortuitous omen.[16] Lee and his parents returned to Hong Kong when he was three months old.[17]
Bruce's father, Lee Hoi-chuen, was Han Chinese, and his mother, Grace Ho was of Eurasian ancestry.[18] Grace Ho was the adopted daughter of Ho Kom-tong (Ho Gumtong, and the half-niece of Sir Robert Ho-tung, both notable Hong Kong businessmen and philanthropists.[19] Bruce was the fourth of five children: Phoebe Lee , Agnes Lee 
, Peter Lee, and Robert Lee.
Grace's parentage remains unclear. Linda Lee, in her 1989 biography The Bruce Lee Story, suggests that Grace had a German father and was a Catholic.[20] Bruce Thomas, in his influential 1994 biography Bruce Lee: Fighting Spirit, suggests that Grace had a Chinese mother and a German father.[21] Lee's relative Eric Peter Ho, in his 2010 book Tracing My Children’s Lineage, suggests that Grace was born in Shanghai to a Eurasian woman named Cheung King-sin.[21]