Let's Find Out - (Pt. 2a) The Complete Life of Bob: A Bob Ross Deep Dive: Part 2

Episode Date: June 19, 2022

This is part 2a of 3 parts of my Bob Ross Deep Dive series: Part 1: His Legacy https://youtu.be/xrqTnUO5Mfc Part 2A and 2B: this audio (broken in two for the podcast audio) Part 3A: The Philosophy of Bob Ross: Ancient History and Modern Leisure Part 3B: The Philosophy of Bob Ross: Industrial to Digital Revolution Let's dive deep into Bob Ross's humble Florida roots, learn about his interests, his friends, mentors, and family, and follow him to Alaska where he cultivated a joy that he'd eventually share with the world. Let's find out what made Bob Ross into the mysteriously placid man who's still winning us over nearly 30 years after his death. A special thank you to all my Patreon supporters over the past few months while I've been diving into this cultural figure who's impacted what I do so profoundly. I hope this series is worth it. -Rich Timestamps/Chapters: 0:00 Intro 3:39 Childhood 34:52 Early Adulthood: Air Force, Family, and the Alaskan Landscape 1:09:08 The Coming Career Shift 1:28:36 Bill before Bob: Wilhelm Alexander's Story 2:15:39 Bob: "The Happy Alaskan" (where this one ends) 2:43:08 Hello Annette, Goodbye Bill 3:21:12 Bob Ross, Inc. 3:31:21 Why Bob Succeeded: Sincerity, Style, Preparedness, and Vision 4:25:03 Bob's Reputation: Andy Warhol, Thomas Kinkade… and Bob 4:48:49 Bob Ross, Inc. is not Bob Ross 5:44:01 Changing of the Guard: Bob Ross, Inc. Since 2012 6:02:02 Steve Ross's Comeback (with Dana Jester) Main sources: Sex, Deceit, and Scandal: The Ugly War Over Bob Ross' Ghost by **Alston Ramsay** https://www.thedailybeast.com/sex-deceit-and-scandal-the-ugly-war-over-bob-ross-ghost Netflix Documentary: "Bob Ross: Happy Accidents, Betrayal & Greed" by Director **Joshua Rofe** and producers **Melissa McCarthy and Ben Falcone **(https://www.netflix.com/title/81155081) "Happy Clouds, Happy Trees: The Bob Ross Phenomenon" by **Congdon, Blandy, and Cooeyman** (https://www.amazon.com/Happy-Clouds-Trees-Ross-Phenomenon/dp/1617039950) PBS doc "bob ross: the happy painter" and "brush strokes"(official publication of the tv art club by BRI) + communications w various people Minor Sources Directly About Bob/Joy of Painting: https://artsfuse.org/235381/film-review-bob-ross-happy-accidents-betrayal-greed-painting-by-plunders/ - https://thehustle.co/why-its-nearly-impossible-to-buy-an-original-bob-ross-painting/amp/ - https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-bob-ross-owes-happy-trees-forgotten-painter - https://biographics.org/bob-ross-biography-the-man-behind-the-canvas/ - https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2021/10/bob-ross-inc-joan-kowalski - Alexander Cruz's testimony

So you guys are really along for this deep dive. Okay, well, welcome back. This man is everything you see... Look at what we have. Beauty is everywhere. You only have to look to see it. And everything you expect. We get letters from people.

Say they just sleep better when the show's on. That's all right. And then some. I hope you're absolutely plagued with dissatisfaction through your whole life. Because if you are... You'll always strive to do better. There's a lot more than meets the eye to Bob Ross.

Part one was a little, a lot of an introduction to this part and part three. Although we're going to see, we'll see how many parts. But today is a chronology, a biography more so than a analysis. Part three is going to be more along the lines of internal. interpreting, analyzing, putting Bob in his greater cultural, social, historical contexts, getting to know to, getting to kind of see some of his cultural predecessors, or maybe on the screen it would be this way, from left to right, to his progeny, his successors, who he was influenced by and indirectly or directly influenced.

myself included although I'm not not a culture in the not a key figure in the cultural landscape to buy a long shot landscape wow I can't can't speak maybe it has something to do with it rich I wanted to know

as much as I could even though there's still some gaps in his life there's a lot that we've found out about Bob and

a lot of events that shaped him, how he shaped his own legacy and destiny and his own trajectory into becoming the painter, the person he was, which was quite a drastic shift from the first part of his life. But he actually will find out continued a passion for painting in an artistic bent, even in a explicitly non-artistic career through just sheer discipline and determination and

dedication to his craft he he was an impressive figure the more the deeper we dive into discovering who Bob Ross was so let's begin Let's begin with the beginning.

Here we go. Yep. And it's done strictly and completely out of here. It's just for love of these creatures. Not that it means much, but it was really cool for me in particular to know Bob Ross is a native, a fellow native Floridian. He was born in Daytona Beach to Jack. and Ollie Ross. Jack was a professional carpenter

by all accounts, and Ollie was a waitress. So they were working class parents. They, certainly, from what Bob said, they didn't have a whole lot growing up, but they made two.

They made the most of it. Pierce Jack interestingly died fairly young at 63 years old and Ollie not too much older at 71 in 1991 as we'll see that becoming a piece of the precipitation of really unfortunate events in Bob's life later on. That was one thing that was pretty interesting and I think not going to make too much of it but he has Cherokee heritage. Actually in this book here, they found on lost souls genealogy.com that his paternal

ancestry includes members of the Cherokee nation. And given that Bob was born in the 40s, in 1944 in fact October 29th 1942 I wrote a pretty extensive kind of biography on Bob here or an outline of one at least

and I forgot to put the actual day and even year he was born that's hilarious but I'm pointing to him being born in 42 just to mention that

um naturally the further back in time you were born more likely that his ancestry was pretty closer to him so he might have been up to like one fourth Cherokee and I think it's interesting

that he painted landscapes and was so in touch with nature and was so in love with it enough to make it his whole of his whole career

You know, second kind of scenes because, you know, to be honest, I'm a nature freak. I left to walk through the woods and talk to the animals. You need to understand nature to appreciate the great, great things that have been created. He was born in Daytona, but he actually moved and was raised, spent most of his childhood in inland Orlando. It's not anything like you would know today, even as a native Floridian. being just a magnet for, you know, Disney World and just a big sprawling kind of suburban, urban, mostly suburban cities and towns around that. And any Floridian's going to know that any 15-minute drive away from the coast inland on this peninsula

puts you pretty quickly in farmland. I mean, you could be in almost any southern, you know, deep. part of a southern state and you wouldn't know it southeast at least it yields pretty quickly to either farms or just straight swamps and

raw nature I'm sure I'm sure it mirrors the population of Florida mirrors the population of the world quite nicely given that in the sense that probably something like 90 or 95

percent of people live somewhere on the coast and it's no different in Florida so he was certainly raised in the country for all intents and purposes he's noted yet you know it's much wilder there let's say and again this is another reason he was very in touch with nature and animals and that remained a consistent part of his life throughout And his mother was a huge part of his life too. And it was a huge part of his philosophy towards animals and his fascination with them. Let's grab the magazine actually. I got a couple quotes out of it.

So this is the magazine that we, at first, kind of casual flipping through of Bob's. You have this magazine learning about Bob's. childhood and his his basic story and on page 10 here he the writers say that here's some cool pictures to bob and his and his brother jim bob says blender brushes are very soft as my father used to say they're tender as a mother's love and in my case that was certainly true certainly true I'm very prejudiced, he says, but I think I had the greatest mother. Interestingly, yeah, Bob's parents came from a split household. They married, divorced when Bob was real young.

Married two, married again, other people, and then divorced them, got back together and ended up splitting up. I don't know if they married a second time, but I'm sure that affects. Bob and made him feel you know find consolation in animals in nature especially when that's probably a big part of his environment growing up was the actual environment and it says here Jim and Bob I think Jim was the younger was Bob's younger brother they had much in common and, you know, they used to sit around and we'd look at clouds. When I was a kid, I used to sit around and, you know, my brother and I, we'd look at clouds, and we'd pick out all kinds of shapes.

We'd see the mean old witch or the candy man or whatever. Pick out all kinds of shapes. We'd see the mean old witch or the candy man or whatever. And they all lived in the clouds. You can see all kinds of shapes in there if you just spend a little time and study it, and you've got a good imagination. all kinds of things and as an adolescent

so Bob one of his pastimes was caring for wild animals injured and otherwise but you know he got an early exposure to nursing animals as he'd become very very you know well known for

other than his painting obviously by bringing on squirrels like pepod and Bobette onto his shows squirrels, local squirrels from around his area, and he'd work with wildlife rehabilitators. It's done strictly and completely out of here. It's just for love of these creatures. And to Diana and all the people around the country who take care of these animals, I tilt my hat because I think you're the most fantastic people there is. To nurse these squirrels, and he had cages and

that he built and it became like a real integral part of his life, of his personal life. Probably remembering peepod to pocket squirrel that was with me for so long. I turned him loose because I don't keep any of these animals, but he hangs around the house. He stays there every day when I walk out, he comes running to me. And we just have a good time together. To actually turn his house into a miniature rehabilitation facility. to help these squirrel

And as a kid He glows snakes Alligators Raccoons Squorals Once he even tried to nurse A baby alligator

In the family bathtub Another time His pet snake Got loose And his mom Flipping on the light At night Uh

The bathroom light In the middle of the night To try to go to the bathroom Finds a snake loose In there I wonder her reaction to that. In the book,

more the his how-to instruction book, More Joy of Painting with Bob Ross. This is a compilation of some of his other instruction books. At the very end, they have a, see if we got that there, they have an About the Artist section, and Bob Ross says, at the last 25 series,

what remains quite magical to is the fact that Bob remains shy and almost unaware of the impact he's had in the art world. And then his quote is that it's really cool. He says mostly I'm pleased that there's more awareness of ecology and nature and God's little creatures. And I'm happy that people are being exposed to something they truly enjoy doing. I'm thankful for the time I share with fantastic friends and fellow friends. painters. I thought that was just

and such a humble thing to say. You know, he really, really deeply cared about the animals and his conservation, the environment.

And I think there was an important part of what gave him, you know, kept him grounded and humble and in touch with reality was just keeping a low profile and doing things like that

that really mattered to him and turns out the wider world a 1992 Orlando Sentinel newspaper article that I'm going to be referring to a lot a few dozen sources that really helped flesh out this biography of Bob

said since returning to Orlando he's befriended a handful of animal rehabilitators. He's converted his suburban backyard into a rehab center for two orphaned baby squirrels, a fox squirrel, and a crow with a smashed wing. And Bob quoted, said, I don't use the pool, but it sure makes for a nice view for them, he noted. Inside his jacuzzi houses an epileptic squirrel. Bob Ross, Ross, it seems, hasn't much use. for pools or jacuzis. And his half-brother Jim,

he, um, who will make a re-appearance later on his life, not in the best of light. We'll see. He mentioned in passing a few times on his show, said, uh, Bob was the best man at Jim's wedding. And Bob said, we used to fight like cats and dogs. You know how brothers are. He's a good man, though. He's a good man.

He's my best friend in the whole world. as children Bob and Jim ran wild through the Florida woods and Bob said shoot we were tough we didn't even wear shoes back then I don't think we had any on this page here another blurp that really you know adds detail to Bob's personality I think

that he was talking about how they used to listen to radio in the it would have been the 50s late 40s you know TVs weren't necessarily as ubiquitous. I mean, definitely weren't, but, you know, it wasn't guaranteed. It was more of a luxury item back then in America, and so they had radios, and there were radio shows and stories, and Bob said that I used to listen to some of the shows, and they'd be sad at the end.

And I'd threaten my brother, if he told anybody at school, if I ever got sobby-eyed over them, over some of these things. So you get a little hint, a little indication of a friendly antagonism between them, as most brothers do. And then speaking about school, Bob apparently got pretty poor marks. I think this is going to be another theme of Bob's life.

It's kind of his aversion to authority figures in school and, you know, traditional ways of teaching. He did poor in school, and I'm going to be relating later that Bob was an effective teacher, and he was a teacher who was able to, through TV, but also through the popularity of himself on TV, he was able to reach a massive audience and lowering the barrier like we talked about in part one,

the intro we we see that Bob was able to he was able to teach painting in a non-traditional way and make it accessible I guess fundamentally that's one of his biggest legacies was the sheer volume of painters and potential painters he was able to reach and liberate from a sense of probably people who wouldn't have otherwise gotten a any encouragement to paint and try to be artistic bob let them know that it's not something you're born with necessarily it takes practice takes maybe an initial inclination but if you follow that and you practice you're going to be good you'll see results eventually and it takes a painter

it takes someone who understands the you know who understands the the pitfalls of using a one-size fits-all teaching approach approach to teaching and instruction you're going to miss a lot of people

because some people have different ways of learning and different ways of viewing the world and they don't interpret information as quickly as some people depending sometimes on the way it's relayed to them and you know Bob dropped out of high school in the ninth grade it's and then he went right into the trades working as a carpenter with his father and I think this is significantly significantly going to impact his philosophy of teaching and education so I think This gave him a lot of empathy for those inhibited by the fear of failure,

like we all are, really. He understood that, you know, there was a lot that many people didn't do just because of that terror of failing. And he understood that you had to break it down and simplify it. And if you only got people to... get their foot in the door, then you never know. They might, they might find they were able to do something. Seeing immediate results in the way Bob promised broke down a lot of the inhibitions

that people usually employ to, you know, that ultimately just prevent them from trying new things and reaching out there and, you know, risking failure. also missing the really meaningful rewards of small successes that add up to to becoming an individual expanding yourself through learning new skills and trying new things and having new experiences and you know all the other things like meeting new people that go along with that His father, being a carpenter, it seemed like, you know, surely he was a good father. He was stuck around. It is interesting.

So in the how-to book bio, it says, inherited his trademanship qualities from his father, a carpenter who took great pride. So Jack Ross, Bob's dad took great pride in his work and gave him firsthand experience in carpentry, showing them that it wasn't that easy to make a shed or a barn. This certainly makes it easier. My father was a carpenter, so I've spent a lot of my life building things. And this gave him a great respect for, you know, trades of all sorts,

but particularly carpentry and craftsmanship. I know how difficult it is to actually make a barn. That's why I say I wished it was this easy to do. You know, Bob always said throughout his whole life, And we're going to find out his mentor, Bill Alexander, did his well. And it might have even been more prolific than Bob, actually. And I always feel good with wood and with iron. I like to hammer iron and I like to put something together.

And you're proud when you have a finished product, you stand back and you say, my God, look what a creative power I developed. Becoming a jack of all trades and just being real hands-on, being a real handyman. and built his own cabin and I think he was like a blacksmith. I mean, in Bill's documentary, we'll find out all about Bill later on. But Bob built squirrel cages. At bare minimum, he was active in doing minor, you know, woodworking projects. And this really made Bob just a blue, he, a blue collar guy is clearly,

his upbringing but he he had an understanding of the working class and he never put himself in the position even well into his success his wild success as a painter and paint instructor and tv host and the owner of a paint company supply company and he always stayed in touch always stayed humble and I even have a couple again like Alexander Cruz who we mentioned in part one I have a couple more anecdotes of just people who personally knew and interacted with Bob and he was as humble of a guy

as he lets on on TV and you know that part of that is just being in touch with what it takes to be a master of a craft and the hard work and discipline it takes to, you know, be in the military for 20 years and keep up a passion at night when you come home, your little soldier at. All while raising a kid, going through divorce, moving, constantly being shipped around.

You know, another interesting, from an article, 91 New York Times article, written while Bob was still alive. an interesting connection with carpentry popped up and I felt like it was interesting to put it in here because they were talking with a struggling painter who was a paint salesman in his late 30s working in some you know sort of a soho section of Manhattan presumably not a very cheap paint store and the guy said sardonically this is bob's happy little corner where they you know had a little stand an end cap maybe of Bob's products and the guy the salesman says we hide them so as not to offend meaning you know they're they're cheap and simple beginner products mr and the guy's

article says he searched for a bright side though says I suppose in a sense he has brought a lot of people in who in who normally wouldn't get involved in art and uh then his co-worker comes up and says yeah but is it art is it really art it's cabinet making is really what it is and uh this guy was a sculptor apparently so he says it's formulaic it's formulaic and thoughtless art is therapy they described bob's style as pizzeria art you know paintings hung in pizza parlors subpar paintings and both these comments i thought was so apt to what we were going to talk about later and breaking down the bigger picture of bob and analyzing his legacy is that you know bob did uh he didn't he wasn't trying to make fine art

he was trying to reach millions of people who would never who would be um pushed away from ever even wanting to inquire into being artistic or art schools or taking art classes because of that exact attitude that is so dismissive of anybody who doesn't have culture and sensibilities, you know, and that's exactly what Bob was doing. And even, you know, Jackson Pollock was a famous artist and Bob purposely used to call him Jackson Pollard. You know, he, he, uh, took, you know, little shots at the art world the famous the fine art world and he didn't have any interest in being analyzed or being a part of that world he wanted to connect with people from an actual standpoint of having a passion for art and painting and what like we talked about

in neandrio it could do for people's own sense of just sense of play and creativity and self-development and you know becoming sophisticated as a person not as a cultural consumer you know or as a status symbol and the second guy just talking about it being a

formulaic and thoughtless cabinet making art as therapy I thought was I guess ironically spot on because the guy was using that condescendingly and as a derogatory description of what Bob was doing but that was exactly what Bob was very aware he was doing he was making it formulaic so that people could again he was opening the door so that it looked and he made it accessible and removed any

intimidation from it you don't have to start by making a masterpiece and he always said that he said if you ever feel like plenty of people mailed in or called in saying that they have problems and weren't satisfied with their painting and he said that uh you know you he used that to underline the message of trying hard work continually applying yourself and your next painting was always going to be your masterpiece. You were always going to have room for improvement, and that was a good thing, because you could learn, and it meant you maintained a humility about you

to not think that you have become a master. And Bob, while working with his dad and with a cabinetry, carpentry, he lost his finger. You know, as we famously, is a famous thing. you know, a bit of trivia to always say about Bob. But I always wondered, did that suggest an influence on Bob's teaching style by how the circumstances around losing his finger? How, you know, what would have, what would have, what would his dad have had to have done to,

did he fail to teach him to be careful enough around the saw? did he give him a false sense of security or did he you know was Bob maybe too careless just intrinsically and his dad warned him

but Bob because he was not one to be to not one to really listen to authority figures you know tell him what to do maybe he was a little rebellious

which by his James Dean haircut that kind of seems like maybe the case. Anyways, yeah, just little speculations like that. Make me wonder what his perspective on teaching, his life, his own, raising his own son, Steve, how that impacted that. Because, you know, any child's relationship with both their parents,

mother and father, are formative. That's unquestionable. So I wonder how that affected Bob. And we'll see. We'll see later on in life. Now, we don't have much more information other than his wife, Vicki, said that when they met probably around 18 years old, at least Bob was, he was already painting a lot. So I think he said at one point he was maybe eight years old when he first, you know, tried to paint.

So he had at least been exposed and been interested in painting for a long, long time. And around 18, in 1961, he joined the Air Force and served around there until 1963 around Florida. There is with his mother, Holly Ross. And we can see

his badge there I don't know if you guys can it's capturing my cursor or not but his badge on his arm there we're gonna get into those insignias or we're gonna just talk about those briefly so clearly that's like one of the first ranks you get when you join the military so he was never a pilot but he was drawn probably I would guess drawn into the Air Force for the same reason he loved fast cars And for the same reasons, he kept his dream of painting alive throughout his entire 20-year career in the military. Here we got a picture of them in the jet right there. And he loved fast cars. Famous for that.

I say famous. I've been reading too much about him because he's not famous for... much more than painting. Later on, he had a 1969 Corvette Stingray with a 350 engine in it, which is a really big engine. The car went pretty darn fast with a Bob Ross vanity plate here.

I think this is desire to go in the Air Force, which has a lot to do, you know, generally with traveling the world. And when you... It's one of the big selling points. people, uh, recruiters used to get people into the military is often saying, hey, you get to travel the world. And Bob clearly had a sense of adventure. He wanted to, he was born way before Orlando was anything worth writing home about before theme parks and Disney put his stamp on there.

And it was an effectively small town that Bob was a Ross was from. Bob wanted to get out of that small town and take an adventure and that sense of adventure and play was with him throughout his entire life. There's Dana Jester with the Bob Ross vanity plate in this picture. That was Dana, Steve, and a, I think Bob Ross, well she wasn't, well she might be a Bob Ross certified instructor, but it says Dana Jester and Steve. Steve, and Steve, I think Bob Ross, well, she wasn't, well, she might be a Bob Ross certified instructor, but but it says Dana Jester and Steve. Ross in a painting event not affiliated with Bob Ross Inc. Dana Jester and Steve Ross. I reached out to them. They didn't respond, but no big deal. Understandable. Totally understandable not to want to respond to a

random, you know, random small YouTuber. But he, he, they both seem like really, you know, nice guys and they're off on their own adventure, their own business venture, and adventure. Teaching painting, again. Not affiliated with Bob Ross, Inc. So Bob had three wives. He met his first wife, Vicky, who he was married to until... We'll find out, actually. For about 15 or so years.

He met Steve's mom, Vicky. Vivian Ridge or Vicky In Florida In their late teens And in the early 60s She followed him to Alaska When he was reassigned there

And In 63 And a couple years later In 66 they would have Steve In the Netflix documentary Vivian Here we can see a

picture of her being interviewed there with Bob Ross painting in the background a couple gold pans of his Here's a younger picture of her real cute real cute She says that he'd stay up I'm assuming this was in Bob's late teens when they first got together And paint until 2 a.m. some nights and although he had to be at work at 8 a.m. So to me and here's a young Bob working away at a landscape newspaper clipping he was clearly already very much infatuated with painting they were married in 65 here's their certificate here on Vicki's Facebook May 31st 1965 it's actually not too far from their anniversary date right now

I hope it wasn't an outdoor wedding because that would have been hot, pretty hot. In their hometown, not exactly sure which town, but Orange County, Florida. That's Orlando's County. And then a year later, they had Steve, and here's a plate right here.

I saw, I got a couple pictures from Vicky's Facebook, and which is an interesting Facebook page by the way if you guys check it out Bob and Vicki Ross's wedding day Bob's aunt

Susie Gatewood that lived in Georgia made this wedding plate for us and it looks like she you know painted it so I think there's clearly some sort of

artistic inclination in their family Vicki and Ollie Olly Ross family portrait that I use for my last thumbnail Vicky

Little Steve and Bob Steve's first I think Steve's first name is Bob Robert as well And his middle name is Steve So he goes by Steve Here's another one of Bob

Bob and Steve Bob looked like a It's like that A little look on his face Looks like he's saying something steveous to steve there interestingly

on Vicky's Facebook here someone asks her about where's Linda Brown Bob's third wife these days and she said I don't know probably moved in with a net in Virginia or New Smyrna who cares

so maybe Vicky knows something about some sort of of a relationship between Bob's third wife and Annette Kowalski. I don't know about that. I'm not sure. And yeah, another thing just while we were on Vicki's Facebook page. It was interesting.

I'm not going to be talking too much. Well, that's, again, not the focal point. The drama between Bob and Steve and. and how the Kowalski's, you know, legally took control of Bob's image and name and likeness once they took over Bob Ross Inc. But, you know, it is a part of Bob's story, so I will be including it. But it, this was pretty interesting that, because the documentary didn't say anything about this. So in 1987, Vicky says the Kualski clan, she put a picture of the Kualski's owner of Facebook.

It says Bob did in fact have a unhappy accident and made a mistake when he met the Kualski's. I know because Bob told me in 1987 while visiting me at my condo. The picture. Yeah, she, uh, Vicky clearly has something. for the Kowalski's and what they did to her son taking all not giving Steve any of the profits any ownership any stakes in the company any stake in the company any stake in the company nothing so it's interesting that we'll be touching upon that later now Bob is in the military he goes joins in 61

is around Florida and then 63 gets shipped up to Alaska and Vivian Vicki goes up there with him they have Steve up there presumably they were they were married in Florida in 65 so maybe Bob you know they had a home or at least flew back and kept Florida as their home base and then at a certain point appeared to have moved full time up into Alaska and, you know, sometime after Steve was 66. I thought it was relevant to include the, just the general nature of where Bob's eventually climbed to in the ranks of the Air Force and some of the descriptors of the actual ranks themselves and how that relates to Bob's choice to take on a leadership position in you know in his own company and really shape his own destiny his own life trajectory during and after the military and he rose i think bob so bob rose to the rank of

master sergeant and um this is this is a position of pretty high authority actually and it turns out that it was the essentially the highest position you can be promoted to without having a college degree at least nowadays and i'm sure it was somewhat similar even back then in the you know in the 70s and was a leadership position which means implies teaching and communicating effectively and you can all imagine that applies pretty pretty well and overlaps pretty thoroughly with what he eventually did on the joy of painting and even down to demonstrating technical procedures which the way he broke down painting into its technical, detailed, very fine, minute steps, applies pretty directly as well. He served, he was master sergeant, that was his rank, and we can see here in the picture here.

So the first rank you get when you join the Air Force, and every military branch, Navy Marine Corps Army Air Force they all have their own ranking system some kind of sort of relates but it's all unique that was what he had on his that was the insignia he had on his on his sleeve in the picture with his mom when he looked pretty young because he probably right fresh out of getting in the military there you work up to from airmen basic to airmen in the airman first class all the way through senior airman staff sergeant technical sergeant you have the same star within a circle and you have what do they call I'm sure I'll have it here but you have the little flares the little wings

that are coming off them and you just increase them in number and then at the staff sergeant you get a set of wings kind of on the bottom let's see if I had and yeah so anyways it evolves as you get higher and you can see the symbol evolves the badge you have until Bob got master sergeant and you can see the master sergeant insignia on his or you could see he earned a few more wings in this picture right here and I think in this one here we could kind of see and maybe not it's pretty dim maybe I can brighten it up in editing this one did he have anything no but this is just this is James Dean hairdo you know you don't just

roll out of bed with that hair so Bob's clearly always been you know interested in his hair and looks and he's always had a sense of style and fashion of course and took that with him into the military as we see raising uh getting risen to the ranks of master sergeant first sergeant he was a medical records technician in fairbanks near near Fairbanks at the Ileson Air Force Base. Master Sergeant is a, it helps us understand exactly what Bob, you know, the qualifications. It's above technical sergeant under senior master sergeant and a technical sergeant that he would have had to have risen up from, and so it's a position he would have held right before Master Sergeant. You hold a, you have, you have, you have to have

to be capable of dealing with seven skill level, whatever that is. I guess it's a sort of ranking of the qualifications that you've officially completed. And capable of dealing with highly complex technical issues, highly complex technical duties, sorry, as well as provide supervision for subordinates. it's known as the second hardest promotion to acquire next to the promotion of

Master Senior Master Sergeant which I think Bob's schooling mostly prevented him from being able to The Master Sergeant indicates it's one of the most significant promotions and this is right off the Air Force website

here in the Air Force it's the point where the airman enters a senior non-commissioned officer tier responsibilities are to start shift from technical towards more commanding duties of larger amounts of subordinates so you're in a pretty upper level commanding managerial position but of course it's also the lowest rank

one can hold to become eligible to be what he became first sergeant, which means that he achieved this rank holding the minimum requirement. Lisa was able to, you know, achieve this rank without, you know, in pretty short succession, I would say, after he achieved the minimum rank. And then lastly, the master sergeant, which is what he ended up retiring as much, must also demonstrate a keen aptitude for further developing their skills and leadership as well as experience in managing and operations. And this ability to continue learning,

continue growing his skill set and his technical abilities and his communication abilities, of course bled over into his TV career and the success. You know, he was very good at something I have to work on, not going too far off the cuff and, you know, trying to use phrases and things that I haven't really, mastered I guess Bob clearly stuck to the script and deviated just enough he told little anecdotes but I'm sure he had you know whether it was a net Kowalski or one of his

producers Sally Sheffield or something keeping him on track if he you know went on too far of a tangent into a story or digression he had those people there I don't I got Ernie and Gracie my dogs but I do know I do that a lot and so it's a skill that you develop and you after watching enough of Bob I noticed that he he repeats a lot of the same anecdotes so they're seasoned he's he's very he can use them almost like tools you know and as filler as uh as applying you know if it's applicable to a certain narrative he's already talking about in a conversation he's already having he can employ them pretty quickly and efficiently and relevantly and he he doesn't deviate too

much from any other given episode you'll notice but also he has the phrases and the stories and the way he talks is is very uniform and consistent and it's professional and it's not very amateur it's very he you could tell he has a sense of mastery i guess you might say with his communication and his presentation of himself there he goes he's tired little tree boy he's had a tough life out here tough old life like me he's had a hard time i don't like yet Boy, it's a pitiful looking old tree. He had a rough life.

He's like me. There we are. You'll certainly have a greater appreciation of nature and all the little things that are run around that we don't pay a lot of attention to. It'll teach you to see nature to appreciate some of the beauty that's around us every day that we take for granted.

So that was very clearly a very massive, overlap and something that helped him a lot as he transitioned into paint instruction and his show and I was able to find out that he didn't just randomly you know paint a little bit here and there and decided to take a leap of faith quit his military career and just go right into you know trying to become what he became It was a very calculated, a very long, something he worked on for years to master painting on his own. And it always had an economic aspect to it.

He always used it. He sold paintings as a side hustle. He also bartended as a side hustle. And apparently he was a cross-country truck driver for a little bit, probably after his initially getting out of at the military. He was a blue-collar guy, and of course he had financial, you know, finances on his mind. And he, regardless of that being some sort of a benefit of, you know, his painting, he kept painting consistently and was very dedicated to it, to the point where he would take

classes and even instruct and show painting demonstrations at an early age as we'll see here You can see man with a brush or sergeant Bob Ross puts the finishing touch on one of three Alaska nature scenes He painted during a recent art demonstration for the employees and retired residents of the Fairbanks Alaska Pioneers home following the demonstration Ross donated the paintings to the retirement home so even back then he had a streak of philanthropy or just you know generosity you might say he but he always kept at it that was the a core thread I'm noticing him Bob for 11 of the 20 years he lived in a that he was 20 years that he was in the military he lived in Alaska and he lived in Washington out near Spokane Washington so outside of those 11 years so I think for a long

part if not most of his military career he was surrounded by beautiful landscapes mountainous landscapes and he says here Everybody likes mountains, whether you live in Florida or Alaska. Everybody likes mountains. Let's now make an almighty mountain. Everybody likes mountains. No matter if you live in Florida or Alaska, mountains are still pretty. He'd comment on how popular mountains were for the Orlando newspaper article.

It says no matter how many mountains I do, people still ride in and they still want mountains. They still want more mountains. And he was stationed outside of Fairbanks, so no doubt like it. If he would have had to commute or whether he lived on base, he would have been surrounded by the Alaskan mountain ranges as a backdrop, a perpetual backdrop, almost wherever you look. And it would have definitely, and the fact that he was a bartender too,

that choice, you know, you could do a million different things as a part-time gig. bartenders are known they're famous to be psychologists almost you know they're there there to talk and interact and socialize and as well as bartend and uh at the beginning the quote affable part-time six foot two bartender served residents and tourists at a local tavern

and I can only imagine how many problems he must have helped sort through from behind that bar you know I imagine he was pretty well liked by everyone, maybe except the local psychologist taking some of their pay, some of their clients. Still, through the long hours of staff sergeant, being a husband, a father, and his second jobs, he still stayed dedicated to painting. And this clip is one of those anecdotes. He always repeats, but it's, I think it's pretty inspirational and pretty encouraging to hear that Bob would you know he would do his duty all day and then at night

He'd hang up his little soldier cap and be able to Explore his own creativity and it's not like that's easy to do isn't it and way easier to just turn on a YouTube video Probably one more entertaining than this or TV Really already enjoy what you do in life If you do then you do a good job I spent half my life in the middle of my life in the middle of And there I had to live in somebody else's world all the time. And painting offered me freedom. And I certainly enjoy what I'm doing.

I spent half my life doing somebody else's thing. I'd come home after all day of playing soldier, and I'd paint a picture, and I could paint the kind of world that I wanted. It was clean, it was sparkling, shiny, beautiful, no pollution. Everybody was happy in this world. That may be how I made it through. That may be how I made it through 20 years of military. Because I could find freedom on this canvas.

There's absolute freedom here. And I think we're all looking for freedom. At least I am. He had the dedication to, you know, do his fatherly duty. Steve always said he was a great father. You know, take care of the home, do a second job and all that. And on top of the, he wasn't a low-level airman. He was a person in a position of authority.

I'm sure the hours were long. I'm sure he had a lot of headaches from his subordinates, you know. And still he found the time to pursue his painting. Although he'd been painting since his teens, according to numerous articles, it was only at the USO club in Anchorage that he took his first actual art class. You know this and taking classes selling demonstrating teaching his own classes at certain points Was just clear indication of his his drive and his Constant seeking to engage with art with art and

And develop a skill and cultivate a Cultivate a talent by pursuing his passion in the the little hours that a little downtime that he had pain on his lunch break go home make a sandwich paint really fast he that's why he jumped on when bill alexander who will be going over and talking about sharing his story quite a bit when bill Alexander popped on pbs in 73 or 74 you know Bob was still there's an anecdote that he was tending bar and watching TV and he saw Bill paint in 30 minutes what took most people to paint weeks to do like we said

and of course Bob jumped on that he saw that probably saw the possibilities probably saw dollar signs probably saw a whole career and he was probably counting down the minutes at that point of how many you know how much longer he had to work until he was able to secure a good enough military pension to support his family and enable him to have the financial freedom to go out and pursue potentially financially risky decision which it was at a certain point we'll see from

vicky's Facebook there's a picture from 1964 Bob and Vicki Ross in Alaska this picture was from Anchorage. Anchorage. So I would guess they lived in Anchorage at a certain point. And it did say he took his first class in Anchorage. So maybe he did live out there. And, you know, when he did take these classes, Drew, his poor experience in, you know, his early school,

he was a frequently found himself at odds with his painting instructors and he said there's a famous quote in you know he was not interested in abstract painting and theories about painting he just wanted to know he's like they tell you what makes a tree but they wouldn't tell you how to paint one by the mid-70s he'd been practicing art for 20 years but he are he constantly been frustrated at all these you know well basically the teachers who couldn't teach him and in a way that was accessible to him so i think his academic struggles and his curiosity he had an open mind clearly as an artist um and he was curious about the world of around him with his love of nature and animals landscapes willingness to travel desire to travel

adventurousness and that's so interesting that he chose to get into the military and become you know that he was able to wear two hats as a painter an open free-spirited painter and a very you know tight-knit military man very disciplined and regimented and had to keep other in line and also shout at people and be very disciplinary disciplinary and but throughout he pursued pursued what gave him what he loved he pursued what he loved I think in around 72 seems like they were stationed in fairbanks from 68 to 72 and they eventually went back there but they were in Spokane, Washington, from probably around 72 to 75. And this was fateful because this was one of Bill Alexander's stops on his tour.

He used to, you know, he had a show in the same model Bill, Bob eventually used, was from Bill, where the show acted almost as a, just exposure to garner interest in what Bill. was doing which was teaching painting and selling paint products all of which Bob would and the Kowalskies and his wife would do later on their own as Bob Ross incorporated and in Washington about 30 minutes away from Washington that was where bill came once a year to teach and instruct and you know Bob like I said he was on that And he tracked Bill down. The Daily Beast article by Austin Ramsey is a huge.

That, the documentary, and that the documentary are the primary sources I'm using for, not primary, that's not the technical word, the main places I got, the information on his life. But I also, like I'm using the articles from Orlando and New York Times, a couple dozen other bits and bulbs from articles I found online about his life and interviews. This book is more about interpreting Bob and his legacy in the art world and culture, the wider culture. But the Daily Beast article, Austin Ramsey wrote, was it. really it came out before the Netflix documentary and was a huge very very in-depth and if you're interested in learning more about Bob which you may or may not be after listening to

this I'd highly recommend checking it out the documentary and checking this book out too while I'm plugging my sources so I'm getting a lot of of this from Austin Ramsey Daily Beast article he wrote Ramsey's article apparently says and I couldn't find anything else to corroborate this particular point that Bob went to Thailand at the tail end of the Vietnam War which is was in 1975 and it was wasn't until after he got home from that that same year that Bob first was exposed and saw a saw Bill, was exposed to Bill and his magic of oil painting. Magic of oil painting.

Although Bob had been selling paintings, and he painted Alaskan gold pans, and been selling them out of the same bar that he had his second job at bartending, selling them the tourists and whatnot. He was making sure a nice little side hustle doing that. I feel like it was a watershed moment when he saw Bill on TV. I mean, that would have absolutely been...

It would have given him a clear vision of where he could take his painting through instruction, selling paint supplies. You know, like I said, Bill's model, he had already clearly tried to find a way to paint much quicker, much more quickly. on his lunch break he was saying earlier he found ways of his own before hearing about Bill that he allowed him to make paintings

really really fast but I think Bill had perfected the wet on wet technique even if Bob had found some sort of similar technique and it was seeing Bill do this that really inspired Bob

and probably gave him, you know, laser, kept him laser focused during the last few years of his military career while he was honing his skills and trying to trap down Bill to get an actual lesson from the master himself. And it was so fateful that, because I'm sure Bill wasn't going all the way up to Fairbanks, or even maybe, maybe not even Anchorage, probably not. He was, though, however, going to Cordillene, Idaho. And this was only 30 minutes away from where Bob and Jane and Steve were living when Bob was stationed at the air base outside of Spokane, Washington. So Bill had made a name for himself. Bill, in his own right, we're very shortly. we're about to go on a brief detour into Bill Alexander's life from a autobiography sort of on his own website because Bill's story is pretty interesting too lots of he it took him a long time it took him a lot of effort

he was an immigrant barely you know I'm sure spoke the language um he toured around traveled almost his whole life until his late 50s. And he found, like Bill, like Bob, he found, you know, Bob was an early bird, got to the painting game early compared to Bill. Bill was a traveling pretty much living paycheck to paycheck, didn't have too much to show for his life. And he knew it, and he was outspoken about it.

for a while when he got its big break painting on a California PBS show and that was able which opened the door for Bob of course and you can see here these guys buddies hanging out together here probably in the early 80s after their rift so bill in his own right had some interesting stories and interesting life And his story of how he got onto TV and to begin with was pretty interesting. And it shows you that, you know, Bill was probably very much a kindred spirit to Bob. And the two probably hit it off right away.

So Bob was constantly seeking out art classes all the time. And there was a friend who ended up becoming the connection between Bill and Bob right around Spokane, Washington. And see if I can find... I think I have a clip. I'll enter the clip here. Here from the documentary Netflix. Bob said, I saw Bill and I fell in love with him.

It took me a year to get in touch with him, though. And so around Spokane, Washington, like I said, from about 70s, too onward for a few years at least before going back up to Fairbanks Bob lived with his family in Spokane Washington State and he went to the local college state community college maybe and met artist teacher John them where John taught he brought John on the show to teach, give a portrait lesson at one point during the joy of painting too. My instructor became a very good friend and after a long period of time he took me aside one evening he says, Bob, I want to tell you the truth. And John jokingly told Bob after seeing he was an

accomplished artist and admittedly said that. He said he makes no pretences about being Bob's teacher. He says he just says Bob wasn't good at doing portraits, but... I want you to go out and paint bushes and trees, because that's where your heart is, and leave portrait painting to someone else. Bob was an accomplished artist in his own right, and John Tham ended up being a conduit because he knew someone who hosted Bill Alexander every year when Bill came around Cordelline, Idaho to teach. and John says Bob showed up one day with two people and he said two friends who themselves had no interest in painting but he had an amazing ability to create art and gather people around him John said well I thought today I would bring that gentleman here his name is John Thelme he comes to us from Cordillane Idaho and he's one of the most fantastic portrait painters in the country and Spokane Falls

Community College is where John Tham taught and Bob was you know just stopping by there on another one of his many stops on his perennial search to learn more about painting and it might not be

you know that maybe Bob was trying to seek out Bill I don't know maybe he was actually taking a class though he didn't have any way of knowing that John knew of a way to get in contact with Bill so it was just one of the many fortunate and positive interactions one of the legacies of Bob just being a humble straightforward honest guy who was open to experience in meeting new people and the doors and and receiving the benefits of the door that that disposition yields.

Here I have a picture, Spokane and Cordoline are really, really close together. And Bob up here, or sorry, Bill's hometown of Powell River, Van British Columbia, I believe. Maybe a few hours away from Vancouver, northwest. So that was where Bill was permanently That was his home base. That was where his home was. And so you could see it's not too far of a drive for Bill To make it to Cordoline. It's going to be leaving the picture so before we do and

Go on to his introducing Bob to Bill I was just saying some remarks John had about Bob was that he was a wonderful man he came around initially just so he could get off base came around to see I guess what paint instruction

classes there were and Bob was as nice as you think he was says John oftentimes people present themselves as one thing on camera and there's something entirely else Bob was the same guy all the way through

That's what John says. Tham paints Ross in the article as a Mr. Rogers-esque figure and we'll be making connections of our own between Bob and Mr. Rogers. Fred Rogers later. He says that's a good comparison between those two guys. Bob was a kind man

and absolutely deserved his success. He says he painted a portrait of Steve when he was, when Steve was about 12 years old, that ended up in the Kowalski's house somehow. And the painting was apparently destroyed in a house fire. And Sam was pretty pissed about that, saying that painting should have never been in the hands of the Kowalskies. It's just another example of Steve being cut out,

which is a little foreboding of the later half of Bob's. unfortunate trajectory yeah Sam John Tham thinks that so much of what happened with Bob and the Kowalski's was very sad Annette Kowalski betrayed Bob

and his family in fact the last phone call this is a little more foreboding here but it's relevant for John Tham here the last phone call he ever received from Bob was shortly before Bob discovered he had lymphoma

which led to his death in 95 so it was probably a couple years before 95 maybe 2, 93 sadly they never spoke after that last phone call before Bob died but Bob

reached out to John to see if he wanted to partake and join up in a help him in another venture Bob was doing as he was splitting off from Bob Ross Incorporated and the Kowalskies towards the end of his life and we're going to find out there's a couple different things Bob did at the end of his life one of them being the children's show that was mentioned

on the documentary that he was doing as a an attempt to I think both maybe not spitefully but not just collaborate, not be affiliated with the Kowalskies in any way, and not have his legacy in control of the Kowalskies, being that joy of painting was completely under the control of Bob Ross Incorporated, which was going to be shortly owned by the Kowalskies after Bob's death. And Bob wanted to have creative control. control over what he did and his likeness and his image and he was going to start in A well he's will talk about it later, but it was an interesting venture and he was going to start he had a whole vision for what he wanted to do

That was going to be a radical not radical but a significant and Definite departure from what he was doing with the joy of painting became friends with John and it just so happened of course that John knew somebody that knew Bill Alexander, who Bob was actively at the time trying to meet. And Stam says, there is a woman in Cordoline, Idaho, or is it Iowa? What's next to Washington? Is it Idaho?

I think it's Idaho. Cordoline, Idaho. There's a woman who knew Opal Brute, who invited Bill at William Alexander up for a work. workshop every year and when I heard about this I told Bob hey hop in the car we're gonna go meet him and that's what we did he introduced Bob to his future mentor and the rest is history and them says you know if I didn't do that maybe Bob wouldn't have been on TV but maybe he would have maybe he would have because you know he loved he quote loved an audience and I

want to do at this point get into a little bit of Bill's own life his struggle his very colorful interesting history and how he became the man how he became the instructor the example Bob was so influenced by and who Bob sought to make acquaintance with The Xander's story is really an interesting one. He's very similar to Bob in a lot of respects. A lot of respects. He was born into a working class family. He was exposed to nature thoroughly at a young age.

He showed an interest in art and painting in particular at a very young age. is and they're drafted into the military. Bob was Bill was conscripted. Bob voluntarily joined the military

because Bill was conscripted during the Nazi party, so he was technically a Nazi, interestingly enough, but you know, by all accounts, Bill, Bob, so easy to get them mixed up. Bill

was a reluctant Nazi. that sounds like a great great comedy title so up to this point we found out that Bob was born into

a working class family he was very influenced by both his parents his mom gave him a love of nature and just an empathy for

you know that sense of caring and compassion and warmth that he obviously still felt towards her and other people due to her influence. His father was a carpenter, a tradesman, taught him the value of hard work, the exposure to true craftsmanship. And I guess really the, probably the first inklings of, I'm sure, you know, if he was anything like me built forts, and explored the woods all day, every day as a child.

And you learn to develop a sense of pride and satisfaction with a completing a task, building, creating anything, making your imagination something you envision come to fruition. And, you know, carpentry is a form of artistry. There's no doubt about that and Bob often Made a point to say you know on a show is when he was painting a barn for instance That it was very I wish It was this easy. You know he often Paints things of course. He's painted them hundreds if not thousands of times by the time we're

watching him on his show, but you know he always he's, of course, he's trying to teach us, and so he makes it look easy, and he also commented that he wishes making a barn in real life was this easy, this straightforward. And see, so he learned those core values, started painting at a young age, nurturing animals, started building, and, started building. constructing, creating. And I was romping through the woods quite a bit, quite a bit with his brother. Got some, uh, I got a cool picture of him. I don't know if it's with his brother. If it is, then his brother is the older one.

But I'm not sure of him holding a really big fish. And you can see the 1940s cars. So Bob had a young age, he dropped out of high school, went into working in the trades with his dad as a carpenter lost his finger. That's where he got his finger. You know, it's a form of trauma. I'll be referring to that in the future. It's not like being amputating an entire limb, an arm, a hand, or leg, but it is still, as it was his. index finger on his left hand.

Like goodness he was a righty, but yeah, generally you, you know, if you're cutting wood, you kind of use your right hand to push it, left hand in the front, kind of leading it and guiding it, and I'm sure it slipped or something very unfortunate happened to Bob losing that finger. it's a small instance of, you know, small little tragedy.

It's not the end of the world. You can get by and make do, but given that, that most likely happened sometime, you know, ninth grade to the 18 years old when he enlisted in the military and started his own career out from under his father. He was young, still a formative time period in his life. And I'm sure he, you know, that's something you have to live with, you get noticed. I'm sure he had to explain it to other people all the time. And as we're, when we dive into more of Bob's legacy in part three,

when we're able to, we're going to analyze him and his persona, his presence, his more, his legacy in depth is, I guess his, really how to interpret and look at Bob as a person, as an artist. One section I will touch on in the next part is Bob as shaman, as healer, as, psychologist, therapist, saint. Part of what can lead a lot of people who end up taking the trajectory of becoming a saint figures

is something that marks you out as an individual early on and a lot of times that's an injury. In prehistoric tribes a shaman is often marked. marked out at an early age by an injury or like an animal attack, sustaining some sort of trauma might be minor or major.

And it makes sense that it radically changes your perception of safety and your, you know, your understanding of where the boundaries of your tribe and the safety within that those boundaries lies and how it can fluctuate if you are pulled out of adolescence by something like that at an early age forced to grow up and radically you know radically shift your paradigm about the world and that can mark people and help them guide them to a point of self-understanding and we'll tip into that later but So he took on responsibility, got married, had a child pretty soon after. He was dating Vicky, got into the military, went up to Alaska to travel, took Vicky with him,

had Steve in 1966 when he was 24 years old, pretty young. I didn't have much out until 302. 31, 32. Definitely a peak millennial over here. He climbed the ranks though. When he, despite not having a degree in higher education, I hear you, buddy, I know. Ernie's getting tired of me talking about Bob Ross.

I'm sure maybe some of you guys are, are too. I don't know. but he he showed an aptitude, a propensity to excel and, you know, he was clearly an intelligent guy. Even if he wasn't a, you know, quote unquote book smart guy, Bob clearly had a drive and to pursue and expand himself. expose himself to all sorts of challenges and new experiences and learn as much as he can. And that came with that personality, you know, Trey helped him climb the ranks, helped him pursue, continually pursue his passion and painting,

helped him even during the very busy schedule and demanding it, you know, a schedule full of responsibilities and stressors, I'm sure, pursue his own interests and his own hobby, most of which was revolving around painting. He was continually learning, seeking out people and mentors who could teach him new things. John Tham, when he was stationed in Spokane, Washington was one of those people. and John Tham ultimately led him to connect with Bill Alexander. Now Bill, Bob, he opened doors. Bill, like we said, he was a traveling art instructor,

didn't find his way onto TV until much later in life. And, well, he has an interesting story. Let's go into it for a few minutes, shall we? He was an immigrant to Canada, and eventually, I think he actually lived all his later life in British Columbia. And in Powell River, I guess it's called. And what we're going to learn about Bill, other than the technical things he developed,

the tools that Bob and at Kowalski, them would so liberally borrow the models for, including the entire business model, and even the use of words like happy little this and happy that and happy little trees and ducks and animals and the almighty, which Bob still peppered throughout in his later shows, but definitely in the first few, you know, the first few years, first, dozen or so seasons of the joy of painting you can hear Bob use pretty a lot pretty often the almighty easel the almighty paintbrush the almighty mountain almighty mountains despite his humble beginnings and tragic upbring.

Another similarity between Bill and Bob, lives marked by tragedy. He was fortunate to have a deep gratitude instilled in him from an early age. And, you know, it's hard to say things, uh, make any deep, um, firm, you know, affirmative judgments about people that you only have video of, but, um, everything I've read about Bill, he seems to have been genuine in his optimism about the good in people's hearts. He had a reverence for nature, just like Bob, a hard work ethic, as we'll see, attempts at started his own business, and he worked for other people, and he always had a desire

to envision a better future for himself, and always chase that dream and actually, he had a pretty radical vision of what he wanted to do with the people he surrounded himself with he at one point it seems like he almost started a commune and yeah he just had a fire in him that we'll see and it comes out in the way he carries himself So, you know, Bob's fire was a slow, steady warmth, Bills was a brush fire. It was an absolute bonfire, just a burst of life, just a thriving within this guy. Really interesting guy. When you reach the height of your tank and feeling, you always wish you had someone to share.

with and here is this part and why I paint so quick because I'm so motivated I'm so full of energy because the land feeds me. My hands do things I don't know even what I'm doing because when you see that I think you feel the same thing. You know he always was attempting to be a successful painter, teacher businessman and he had a clearly very strong desire to share his love of painting with everybody he surrounded himself with. Bill's childhood, like we said it was tragic. In 1914, he was born around the First World War, right around the beginning. An old man packed a wagon with hay and straw and gathered up his pregnant daughter and grandson, her son, and a few family belongings.

They were about to begin a trek hundreds of miles from what would become the site of, one of the biggest and bloodiest battles of that century. That was where Bill, Bill's mother, and his older brother and his grandfather were from. In the early spring of 1915, the daughter gave birth to another son in Berlin. That's where they fled to. It would be two more years before Bill would return to his home or village.

And the First World War was from 1914 to 1919. So Bill was born right in the middle of it. And his entire childhood was marked by the fallout from it. There's a picture of Bill. And Bill's mother holds him steady as she and her brother, Paul, pose for a family portrait in Berlin in 1917. We're all very serious. Gosh, that looks just like Bill. It looks just like Bill.

Using aside and have a reason to be half. 20th century around Bill's childhood. East Prussia was still a feudal society. Villagers, villagers like Bill's family, supporting wealthy landowners while trying to eke out a living for themselves. But after the First World War, there was nothing. and Bill was raised in abject poverty.

He'd written about it in his biography. One in particular painted a scene of his childhood saying there's nothing but dead cows and machine guns bared and laying around skeletons of soldiers half buried with the boots sticking out of the ground. This was Bill's childhood in the fields around him.

Children played among the remnants of war, often injuring themselves as a grenade exploded. But because of his parents, Bill would fortunately grow up with a much different view of life than that which he saw around him. His father denounced war and swore neither his children or his... Or he would have any part in it ever again. In that attitude, actually cost Bill's father his life. apparently he was executed by the Nazis

for unpatriotic sentiments Bill's father however was able to instill in his son the honor to honor life

and to appreciate beauty that exists in the world around them despite all the tragedy Bill's mother was a frail woman who developed tuberculosis when he was young, and in spite of her sickness,

she worked hard to give her family a good life in the midst of such poverty and despair. And you could see that's a strong correlation. I couldn't help, but see the similarity between the overlap, between the childhoods of Bill and Bob both. She was the center of the family life and Bill dearly loved his mother. You know, despite not being above impish, uh, being an impish youth, a little mischievous, a little trickster. Um, you know, he always pulled pranks and had adventures.

I guess he had another brother younger than him. He had a love of family instilled in him. many evening evenings gathered around the warmth of the flickering fireplace and bill accompanying on the fiddle would play and sing along with his family so it seems like bill had a a miraculously beautifully warm upbringing and he carried that with him throughout his whole life seeing the best in people bill's mother died unfortunately when he was fourteen and uh bill poetically was adopted by another mother mother nature that's what he says in his biography And so, you know, he would, such an interesting childhood. 14 years old. It's about when Bob quit high school.

Him. You know, both of them were exposed to the real world at a pretty still very young age. His new mother, Mother Nature, Bill would sleep out in nature. I'm not sure about the climate in German. But I know it gets cold there. I'm sure it's rainy, but he said he enjoyed a few Pleasures that he did have the raw honey from bees. Bill kept it in a wooden cigar box and the sweet taste of yolk from raw eggs from a hen he raised Just a few of the pleasures he appreciated from a young age he was surrounded by animals nature he was in love with the outdoors and he had an artistic bent to a romantic side to him says that no matter how bad things are today there's always tomorrow and tomorrow could be better so in his autobiography he said there was a guy who an itinerant painter who would visit the village and paint for the local the wealthy landowner

Remember, it's a more, still a very feudal society in eastern Germany, Prussia. And most people were poor, working the land and giving most of the profits, because the land was owned by the wealthy elite landowners. And this guy was an itinerant painter. He went around painting murals on wagons and, you know, walls and things for whatever. would want and Bill saw that as a way out of his abject poverty and so he mentored uh he trained under the painter and he says the guy wasn't very good but he sure was thick or the artist wasn't very good but he sure was quick quick and this clearly this uh you know influenced bill and

recognizing the practical side of being able to be good but also quick and turnover paintings very quick. Before long Bill, after finishing or while apprenticing for this itinerant painter, became an itinerant traveling painter himself, you know, and this is really what he did the rest of his life. He was able to travel the countryside, painting portraits, landscapes, farm scenes on everything, canvases, the walls of buildings, wooden panels, carts. And it says, at night Bill slept under the stars, and he painted in exchange for lodging and food. And it was a wonderful opportunity, he says, for a young man to ply his tray, apply his trade, and learn about the world around him. As he moved from one Prussian village to another. Just imagine just doing that.

I can't imagine that. I'm sure some of you out there can definitely imagine that. I grew up way too slowly to imagine being 14 years old and just traveling from village to village in war-torn, Germany and Prussia, and just painting, sleeping under the stars. living, you know, meal to meal. That's quite the experience.

So Bill's, Bill's dream was to be a game warden because it blended the fur, um, his passions of being outside, being connected with nature, painting, caring for animals. And, uh, this didn't happen, though, because it required 12 years. of military service, so Bill joined the army right around the rise of the Nazi party in Germany. And of course, another World War and three bullets would end Bill's dream.

Essentially, he wasn't zealous to fight in Hitler's army and he got he says he got sent on a suicide mission and this is just funny a funny little anecdote because bill he sounds like an actual an absolute hero but of course this is the only account we have of this is bill you know so but he still he seemed like a nice guy so uh he seems like a guy who might embellish things but not flat out lie and be deceitful. He said, Bill's last, my last military assignment was a suicide mission.

Patton's third army, which was the U.S. Army, was approaching officers ordered Bill and his eight men, eight-man bazooka platoon to hold a forward position in front of an advancing army Bill wavered but the officers officers assured him there were soldiers in front and behind for support Bill and his eight men advanced to meet the tanks but he soon realized all his men were alone he and all his men were alone

and then as Bill advanced he looked behind to emboldened his men but they were gone he realized he was alone in front of the American army and desperate to save his life Bill found a nearby French village where he befriended one of the villagers

and convinced the man to let him hide out until he could return to his unit when he awoke the next day he saw a group of German soldiers sitting on the ground with their hands behind their heads. And for Bill Alexander, the fighting was over. So the American and French forces had captured the Germans, Bill being one of them. He got sent to a, what do you call them, P-O-W camp.

And here we see Bill pauses to be photographed. in his new art studio while an American soldier tries his hand at painting a portrait of his brother and his wife from a photograph. Bill's paintings are in the background there. He reconnected. At this time, Bill had had a wife and a daughter, but he knew his future was no longer in his homeland, so he decided at this point after the war to emigrate to America. Bill had a new start in a new country, a country where he could live and believe as he wanted. Bill decided he was going to have it his way. And his story really is an impressive one because he, you know, he built an actual paint supply empire from nothing. He had no, barely any money, nothing substantial enough. He had to work

his way up, save, um, worked multiple jobs to make ends meet, sold paintings on the side, crafted, developed his technique over years. Um, he was asked to teach by wealthy people who bought his paintings and, uh, one of his students, eventually, the wife of a local businessman, paid $500 in the 40s. So that was a lot of money. a couple thousand dollars at least to fly his family his wife and daughter to be with him and so one day Bill happened to meet the owner of a hardware store and they talked about art and artists when Bill told him he was an artist the artist the owner asked him to you know bring some of his paintings and display him in the store and he'd sell them he could sell them at least through

using his store and so the owner invited bill after seeing his paintings to set up a easel in front of his store and i'm sure bill had talked to him and talked to him and then explained to him that he can paint pretty fast and so the uh the owner says hey do some demonstrations at our store you can both drum up business for me and uh you know sell paintings and have an establishment without having to pay rent or whatever and uh This was apparently Bill's first introduction to painting in public for a crowd. And this would be something Bob would eventually follow in the footsteps on working. You know, Bob left the military and worked for Bill as we will shortly find out.

But this was how Bill got his feet wet, you know, and got into, being able to really support him and his family for the next 20 years at this point so as he traveled across Canada gaining more and more attraction doing the same thing at shopping malls and demonstrations any place art stores places he could find he would he would develop a like I said a way

getting quicker and more efficient and making larger paintings and he used progressively larger brushes until he got to have a two-inch brush like he he and he taught Bob to do um big brushes big big palettes pretty big canvases started perfecting the a la prima the first attempt the wet-on-wet technique that allows you to finish completed painting. You know, you can always go back after it dries and touch it up later, but you can finish the bulk of a painting and make it good enough to pass as a completed, competent painting in, you know, 30 minutes as Bill and eventually Bob would do on their shows. And this is a 500-year-old technique, of course, but Bill took the technique to yet another level. Bill's first and

major innovation was to slick the canvas to be able to blend the colors on the canvas rather than on the palette and making the perfect colors and then applying it layer by layer and he called this in the big brush and the larger canvas made this easy and he called this mixture magic white and that was his his base layer and we could see his advertisement W. William, Wilhelm, Alexander's Magic White, number one, invented and successfully used by the title he gave himself,

The Old Master Painter from the Far Away Hills. Really kind of a fantasy Lord of the Rings vibe to it. I bet that's sold. I bet that's old. His major three, he had three major innovations, the magic white, using very thick paints like Bob, of course, having copied Bill's method always promoted,

saying that you can't blend, you know, the paints will just smear and it'll all blend together into just a big, they won't have clear, distinct lines if you already have a layer of thin, a layer of wet paint and you put real thin paint on that it's just going to blend like water colors probably and uh so you have to use thick paint that's the second innovation on top of the first innovation magic white and the third innovation was using big tools and uh a unique palette knife that bill being a handy man himself was able to was able to uh craft on his bench grinder in shape.

So that was out throughout the 40s and 50s. Bill was just traveling, trying to work on his business model. And in the 60s he was able to open a school, an art school, and make a name for himself while also traveling and promoting his teachings all throughout the country. I mean, there's a lot more to his story, but this isn't the Bill out of. Alexander story. This is about Bob and he Bill had a lot of hard times. You know, he was broke most of those years and he got very, you know, down about that. He took in, let's see, a couple of the interesting little anecdotes. He ended up divorcing his first wife, Marguerite,

and married another woman named Marguerite also. They bought a Volkswagen bus and And it had really big windows, so he would just tape his windows up with tape the paintings up into his windows. And they were acted like little display cases. It was like a mobile display case. And Bill eventually found himself traveling up and down the west coast of both the U.S. and Canada. And that was California and Washington, which ended up being the very area Bill. Bob met Bill He took in a 17-year-old off the streets

But that ended very unfortunately Bill tried to teach him to paint And that didn't work out for the guy Apparently But you know that showed you what kind of guy Bill was He was always trying to see the best in people And help people And he used painting as a way of

teaching people the power that they had within them. Yeah, there were several stories about Bill, the Volkswagen, breaking down, and he would have to sell a painting. He would have, you know, a couple paintings and just have to sell them on the spot to make enough money to be able to pay for the repairs. Bill and Marguerite traveled back and forth across America when they were living in Los Angeles and Canada.

Bill loved being outdoors. He had an affinity with Mother Nature, as we talked about. And he loved America, you know, the Americas, North America, and the vastness and grandeur of the country. There was nothing like this in any, in Europe anymore, because it had been civilized, domesticated for thousands of years now. So America, Bill, was like a big, park her mighty snow-capped mountains and miles of solitary desert captivated him the vast

stretches of green land made Bill feel that mother nature was always at work obviously equated nature with freedom and a blank canvas for him to be creative and and with and with he finds TV after about 20 years of roaming and cross Canada in the western United States with his second wife using their Volkswagen as a home studio gallery he always felt and he kind of was destitute and Los Angeles was a major stop for Bill and to tell to he hired a manager at one point to sell help you know, mediate selling of his paintings, and the manager was always keeping an eye out for TV spots

and other ways he could promote Bill in his paintings in his art school that he had going on, and it turns out that in 1973, a game show of sorts called Dialing for Dollars was on a local TV station in Los Angeles. and this was the show that Bill, let's see, created, you know, he was on there as a gimmick as a fast painter. The audience phoned in while there was different acts, and Bill was one of those acts. And like we said, it didn't lead anywhere immediately, but not too long after in the fall of that same year, 1973.

The station, K-O-C-E, the PBS station in Los Angeles, said that they were, the station was looking for something different in educational programming. Seems like that's something that's gone by the wayside these years, but these days. But they thought that they might, so the manager got him basically a tryout, you know, an interview, and he had to tell. demonstrate himself in his painting to the producers and the magic of oil painting was born shortly thereafter. I have an article here from a magazine in the 80s talking about Bill. A quarter million viewers. He's fun to watch. He's a character.

Said one of the guys talking about Bill. An enormous audience in Chicago and they said, And, you know, his put-off, viewers might be initially put off by Bill's thick German accent, sometimes awkward manner on TV, which, don't blame him, I would definitely be the same. But the minute he picks up a paintbrush and he starts to become very dynamic, he pulls you in and one forgives any moment of awkwardness. And that's when the magic starts to happen, he's watching him paint in 30 minutes. from a blank canvas to a finished landscape painting

and they said here a very important influence on Bob was pointed out here by the another quote about Bill says what he's doing is painting but he's also selling a philosophy of life and his philosophy is don't be afraid to try knew in different things he inspires that drive to see to do it that's what his mystique is the

flak the doubt in bills in the success of and the demand for what Bill was doing and ultimately Bob of course one of the producers admittedly said that he doubted it would be successful. He's like, you gotta be kidding me, you don't, you don't expect us to run that. And then, uh, later on in life, Bill reflected about how he almost gave up pain because it was so difficult to, you know, get by and make a living at it. And, um, now in just a few short years, he was teaching millions of people to paint all through the magic of television. His fans continued to write and ask for techniques. Many more wrote to ask Bill about his creative power,

the happiness and joy of painting, and his philosophy of life. That might have been a dig because this was on Bill's website at Bob and they're later falling out. But Bill, just like Bob, Bill was, before I'm truly believed that if everyone painted, the world would be more peaceful. There would be more beauty in the world.

You can see through that brief little tour through Bill's life, there is a major overlap in the upbringing, the environment, the life experiences, and the philosophy that comes with those similarities between Bob and Bill. So it's not any surprise that they hit it off. And they, you know, Will, William, Bill Alexander took a liking to Bob when John Tham introduced Bob the late 70s. So that was Bill Alexander. Like I said, that just, it helps you understand what it would take, maybe what experiences would lead to someone being so passionate about painting and sharing and teaching. painting, even though they weren't technically professional paintings, painters for so long.

Bill was doing a lot of odd jobs and working regular jobs to support his painting before it became a for at least a decade when he first moved into Canada before it became a real career and something he was able to support his family and wife. wife and daughter home with. But now we go back to Bob. Bob was 15 years into what would eventually be a 20-year career. And he, Steve, in the documentary, his son said how often he, you know, found solace and pursued painting all the time and all his free time, which wasn't that much, like we said,

Bob said I took one class and I went crazy I knew this was what I wanted to do so he you could tell he was wrapped by Bill and what Bill was doing and the last two to three years of Bob's career he stayed in touch with Bill and he was offered a job by Bill and to be an instructor I saw Alexander

about a year to finally my study with Bill once he was out of the service. I retired from the military, they offered me a position with a magic art company as a trail in a yard instructor. And in 1981, after hitting the 20-year mark, probably not a day longer than it took to secure a nice pension from the military. They do have time constraints. Bob retired and hung up his little soldier hat for good. And it's at this point that well past the middle of Bob. short life with a fair retirement income to support Jane and Steve back home now.

He'd been divorced and married Jane in the meantime. I think he married his second wife, Jane, in 77. It was now that Bob retired and climbed out alone in search of that proverbial fruit. and it's this here that is the next chapter of his life where Bob really branched out, took a risk, a financial one, and a existential one. I mean, he was a, he was always a painter, but he was a military man, and that was a big part of his identity. So if he would have failed as a painter, you know, I'm sure he would have felt pretty

discouraged about that. Painting. Painting should always be fun. Should make you happy. That's when you're truly an artist. For so many years, painting painting had to where it wasn't fun anymore. It became work. Until I

had the opportunity to study with Build and learn this fantastic technique. And he made it fun again for me. So Bob knew he needed to take this seriously. and if he was going to do it his wife Jane

he promised her that he either was going to succeed and work for a bill and make this happen and maybe start his own venture maybe he always had that in mind it's not clear but or he was going to come home

and he promised her that he would do his come home and be a good domestic husband and father if it did didn't pan out and he would just take up a job to supplement his income around the house.

So we begin the most meaningful chapter of Bob's life, as he put it, as he put it. By the late 70s, Bill starting his show in 73, 74, about the late 70s he was six years into it. that had greatly expanded his reach as an art instructor, and he had a small empire. It was a budding empire from his television fame, and Bill had gone from one-off workshops and small-scale painting exhibitions at malls and stores to having an entire traveling demonstration circuit

complete with his own set of certified Alexander Technique instructors, and paint supplies. And Austin Ramsey in his Daily Beast article makes a cool juxtaposition. It's a fun contrast. Compare and contrast between Bob. He says Bob was a tall, lanky American, All-American, red-blooded military man

who drove fast cars compared to Bob's, you know, slow putting around in the, you know, clanky Volkswagen bus loved fast women drank scotch uh scotch on the rock smoked Marlboro Reds he was a laser-focused detailed oriented ex-military man driven to excel bill on the other hand was a short stocky German immigrant with a neck like a linebacker's fingers like sausages this is all Austin Ramsey here and about as much energy as the sun it's beautifully descriptive because it's so true

everything Bill says and I'm sure I've put a couple in here by now is powerful loud boisterous humble but energetic really energetic but he was incredibly warm gave out hugs like candy and was often generous

to a fault that might have been his fault his generosity that he showed Bob and the Kowalski's poetic aspect of what Bob a phrase Bob

would come to use from Bill is the connection between in painting you can't have light without the dark and they rely on each other and just like in life you can't he thought recognize the good times unless you had a little sorrow a little grief to contrast those against and it was poetic because well because there was a lot of

tragedy in Bob's life and bills too as we saw but there is another another aspect of bob's life that i actually hadn't thought of is how far north fairbanks alaska was if you've never been to alaska you're to go see it's almost unreal i was born and raised in florida and i was almost twenty years old before i ever saw snow and how short the days are how long the summer days are but how short the winter days are but how short the winter days are up in Alaska there, that far north in Alaska especially. I looked it up and in the dead of winter, Bob was sent in the dead of winter as a rookie officer who he was young, but he had never, he grew up in Florida, we're here, you know, we, I think the sun sets earliest is like maybe with daylight savings time,

maybe 5.30, 6 o'clock in the day. you know, peak winter solstice, December 23rd or something like that. Bob was sent up there where the daylight lasts less than four hours. Four hour days, 20-hour nights. And my favorite uncle, Uncle Sam, he sent me up there in January. I thought that would be funny. It was funny. He'd never seen snow.

Even in Orlando, it's a little north of me. You don't get much more than a frost, even on the coldest winter mornings. And he had a little anecdote where he slipped and fell and busted his butt. I'll probably put this here. I got off the plane. The first thing I did was stepped on the ice and fell on my bottom because I didn't know how to walk on ice. Now I'm taking some liquid white and going right into titanium horn. Dealt with that for 12 of his 20 years.

He was up north and fairly. and now 20 years later he was almost like Odysseus, you know, returning back to civilian life into the light, metaphorically and literally, where he was about to begin a new adventure that would become the highlight of his whole life. Bob began working for Bill and he began as a grunt. You know, he went, traveled the circuit, which I'm sure was tired. some it was probably not easy work despite being Bill's star pupil apparently the lessons he managed to arrange barely covered the bills in the first few years after he quit the military and joined up in Bill's adventure it was just relentless touring around the country barely making ends meet and Bob was on the road up to eight months a year. That's a long time, eight months a year.

He'd show up at cheap motel hotel ballrooms. Ramsey says, or a church or a civic center or one of the countless mom-and-pop shops that dotted the country, dotted the nation days before our current conglomerates like Michaels and Hobby Lobby. but Bob again he had a disciplined hardworking military background he knew how to see things through and make calculated risks

and he worked his way up in the military on these characteristics he'd been able to manage logistics and especially be able to command command a trust and a loyalty from those under him, probably through being very personable. Maybe he yelled a lot, you know, that's part of the name of the game in the military. It's just part of the occupation. But I'm sure he kept those around them goal-oriented, optimistic, buoyant, focused.

And it really, given all this, it didn't seem in Bob's nature to fail. And he was dead set on him and his family making this a successful venture. In the book, they talk about how committed Bob and his family were to doing this. And Bob and Jane actually traveled and were living in a motorhome. so that Bob could study with Bill. This must have been right after he quit. She invited her niece to live with them and help run the business.

Two years into the joy of painting, Jane and Steve moved from their permanent home in Alaska to Kentucky, eventually moving in with the Kowalskys for a short time as Bill, as Steve talked about in the documentary to save money and, and run the business out of their home. And so Jane was an important part of enterprise that would become Bob Ross Incorporated.

And, yeah, I think just what they said here, Bob's family life at this time was consumed by making the business work. So this wasn't just a lighthearted, thoughtless adventure. Bob was trying his heart. to really make a profitable business model and one that would be successful and be able to provide for his family. And he did, he did.

But he also put in the work it took to get there. So even though he did use a lot of bills, you know, techniques and tools and his general business model, I don't think it would have worked. without Bill Bob's dedication without Bob's sense of commitment making it grew an audience following within Bill's company Bob his own teaching style was what he was honing his own teaching style is which was quite a relaxed style was a departure from Bill's you know famous bombastic gusto that uh

as Ramsey put, she felt like encouragement by sheer brute force. Sheer brute force. Bill expected his apprentices to use the same language and style, but I'm sure there was a slow rupture between them as they had differing outlooks on what was successful and how to approach and teach. present themselves. We could see here we got Bob's build aggressive clouds. You have it into the inside, you see? There you are. You have two happy clouds

and there's other happy clouds and there's other happy, happy cloud there you see, and talk to yourself. Tell yourself you are wonderful. And then we compare that to Bob's style, his gentle clouds. Let's make some big old fluffy clouds that live up here in the sky. Tiny little circles. Tiniest little circles. There we go.

And so we compare, we can see Bob, you know, probably honed this over hundreds of classes. I'm sure he taught over the couple years before he started Joy of Painting. And Bill seemed to actually outright dislike, speaking softly. softly. He'd catch himself being too calm sometimes and interject more energy. It was almost comical the way he did it. And then towards the end there, I felt like there was an episode I caught that Bill, it was after the rift and I'm sure Bill was saying he was making a thinly disguised critique of how Bob taught and how he portrayed himself. I can do it the other way around.

I could say, oh, you're a lousy painting, and put the lousy clothes on there, and I fiddle around, and I hate that. Oh, he was saying, hey, are you still sleeping? Can't you wake up? What's wrong with you? Okay. Bill's nickname before Bob became the happy painter. It was, Bob, you know, took that from Bill.

Bill was the happy painter. And Bob billed himself as the Alaskan, the Happy Alaskan while he was under Bob's mentorship. And, you know, they were both, they had a lot of features in common, as we can tell. But, you know, Bob, I don't think, ripped Bill off wholesale. I think Bob, the reason he was able to so successfully take what Bill had done and accelerate it and improve upon it in such a successful way was that he had these intrinsic qualities about him already before meeting Bill and even hearing about Bill.

That just allowed him to be a successful guy and use, take a... somewhat successful business model that Bill had and just accelerate it into the you know launch into the stratosphere even in the first episode of season two in their first season two was the first season that they started in Muncie Indiana the first season like I said was not so well produced and so it got buried and now it's on YouTube though on Bob Ross's channel and Bill was mentioned in the first episode. This is a fantastic method of painting where we use a wet-on-wet technique.

And before I go far into the show, I'd like to take a few minutes and make a dedication. And Bob gave due credit to Bill and showed his respects, because even then the first couple seasons, you know, first seven seasons, first couple years, Bob was still working for Bill selling his own paint supplies. I would like to dedicate this show to my beloved friend and teacher, whom we've all watched and loved for many years on public television, Bill Alexander. And he wanted to make a point to praise Bill as a mentor and friend and who had been so such an instrumental figure and who as Austin Ramsey says in allowing Bob the opening the door for Bob to become start a show and give him the opportunity to become who he was and years ago bill taught me this fantastic technique and I feel as he gave me a precious gift and I'd like to share that gift with you.

Bob's health starts becoming a factor at this point. I really wonder if Bob's soft-spoken style. So my mom has migraines and she suffers from them multiple times a month and she's out for a day or two at a time. I really can't imagine what that's like. I'm fortunate that I don't, but apparently Bob did. and I know when you're suffering like that you want to minimize the stimulation you know you want to black out the blinds

no light no minimal sound maybe even you know put headphones in and I really wonder I haven't found any hard evidence Alexander Cruz who I talked to a former student didn't really have anything to add to that he didn't think he thought it was just Bob's person personality but the fact that Bob seen page 28 here he had a reoccurring health issues and headaches were just one of them he had reoccurring lymphoma here it says uh but 92 93 he was re-diagnosed with lymphoma again but it said here that he'd received an original diagnosis an original diagnosis long

before, quote, long before the joy painting even began. And the illness had been in remission for years. He returned, though, as Bob neared 50. And I wondered how much of a actor that played in how Bob presented himself and how he, you know, his actual teaching style and also personality outside the offset and outside the classroom too. because I know I'm sure if you get headaches you don't want to be loud

and bombastic like Bill was and maybe that just carried over into his teaching and he in the documentary they say that he the main cause of him doing that was a reason for it was because he thought that

that's what his audience being primarily female was most you know attracted and receptive to and that I think could be you know another motivation for him doing that it could have been just a compound motivation so at this point the Kowalskies entered the picture because

Bob from about 81 well really it was a pretty quick turn of events from Bob exiting the military in 81 he joined in 61 at 18 retired at a awesomely you know at a awesome at a young age which is awesome for him 38 you know but he had put in 20 years by the time he was only 38 years old so that's maybe a lesson for any of us not me anymore I guess any younger late teenagers any younger people watching this wondering what they want to do if you start something at 18 you can put in 20 years and if it's a career with a pension you can have a nice pension by the time you're 40 which trust me being in my young my early 30s now comes up quicker than you think so yeah pretty awesome for bob to be able to have that pension

and already be successfully well into his art career with Bill by the time he was not even 40. 81 to 82 was when he was touring with Bill. And it was in one of those classes in Florida that Annette's husband Walt had driven. her down to attend.