📍Indiana, PA 15701, USA
1908 – 1928“I was born in May 1908 in Indiana, Pennsylvania, a small town in the coal and farming hills east of Pittsburgh, the eldest child and only son of Alexander and Bessie Stewart. My father ran J.M. Stewart and Company, the hardware store on Philadelphia Street that my grandfather had founded, and everyone expected me to take it over one day. When I was a boy we moved into a brick house my parents built on top of Vinegar Hill, overlooking the town and just a short walk down to the store. Ours was a devout Presbyterian home, full of music: my mother played piano and organ at church. One day a customer who couldn't pay his bill gave my father an old accordion instead, and I taught myself to play it. I was a shy, gangly boy who spent hours in our basement, building model aeroplanes, doing chemistry experiments and putting on plays with my sisters, Mary and Virginia. My father was a big, stubborn, loving man, and his sense of right and wrong shaped me for life. I went to Mercersburg Academy and then to Princeton to study architecture, where I joined the Triangle Club and caught the acting bug. Hollywood followed, and films like Mr Smith Goes to Washington and It's a Wonderful Life. When I won my Oscar in 1941, my father put it in the window of the hardware store, where it stayed for twenty years. Today the Jimmy Stewart Museum overlooks the town, and my statue stands in front of the courthouse.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today