📍Orlando, Florida, USA
1942 – 1961“I was born in Daytona Beach, Florida, in October 1942, and I grew up in Orlando, back when it was still a quiet town of orange groves, lakes and swamps, long before the theme parks came. My father, Jack, was a carpenter, and my mother, Ollie, was a waitress, and we didn't have much, but there was a lot of love in our house. I had a half-brother, Jim, whom I adored. I loved animals more than anything. As a boy I took in every injured or orphaned creature I could find: squirrels, armadillos, snakes, even a young alligator, and I nursed them until they were well enough to go free. Years later I brought some of my little friends, like my squirrel Peapod, onto my television show. I wasn't much of a student, and I left school in the ninth grade to work with my father as a carpenter. It was in his workshop that I lost the tip of my left index finger in a saw accident, though it never stopped me holding a palette. At eighteen I joined the Air Force, and they sent me to Alaska, where I saw snow-capped mountains for the first time. I took a painting class at the USO club in Anchorage and learned the quick wet-on-wet technique, and I promised myself that if I ever left the military, I would never raise my voice again. From 1983 I painted happy little trees and mountains on The Joy of Painting, and I always tried to share the gentleness I learned caring for those small creatures in Orlando.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today