Michael Joseph Jackson was an American singer, dancer, and composer born in 1958 who died in 2009 at the age of 50. He first gained fame as a member of the Jackson 5 in the 1960s before launching a successful solo career in the 1970s and becoming a global pop icon with his 1982 album Thriller, the best-selling album of all time. In his personal life, Jackson owned a ranch in California where he built an amusement park and zoo.