Factbox: Folksy Warren is janitor's daughter, Wall St foe

(Reuters) - Elizabeth Warren, tapped by President Barack Obama to lead the creation of the new U.S. consumer financial watchdog, is a Harvard professor who hails from Oklahoma and is viewed as a foe of Wall Street.

Here are five facts about Warren, who will serve as a special adviser to Obama and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner:

* Warren, 61, who wrote in a blog on Friday of her grandmother "pulling up her socks and getting to work," comes from a family that saw financial hardship during the Dust Bowl and Great Depression of the 1930s. Warren, whose father worked as a janitor, entered college at 16 on a debating scholarship.

* She is a bankruptcy expert and an outspoken advocate for cracking down on abusive practices concerning credit cards and "pay day" loans. She likens the products to a "flaming toaster" requiring stricter regulation and was the first to propose the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau she will now help create.

* Warren believes the economic system is "rigged more and more unfairly" against the middle class, her daughter Amelia Warren Tyagi said in an August interview. "It drives her nuts," said Tyagi, who co-authored the best-selling book "The Two-Income Trap" with her mother on the financial struggles of American families.

* Warren has had tense moments with Geithner in the role she has held since late 2008 as head of a panel overseeing the $700 billion financial bailout. In hearings about the bailout, she has grilled him about how the money was spent and whether the Treasury was doing enough to spur small-business lending.

* Warren has known Obama since his days at Harvard law school and is close to some of his aides. She has a particular rapport with top White House aides David Axelrod and Valerie Jarrett. She knows economic adviser Larry Summers from his past tenure as Harvard's president. Over dinner in April 2009, she made the case to Summers for the consumer agency and helped get him on board.

(Writing by Caren Bohan in Washington; Editing by John O'Callaghan)