Paul Austin Jennings was born in 1930 on the remote Hoopa Indian Reservation in Northern California. After an unusual and exciting early life living among the Indians, eating bear meat, skinning skunks and dining on roasted eels from the Mad River. Paul also moved to a small Central California town for his grammar school years, a time of innocence and lessons learned during the Depression and World War II. He later became a teacher, coach and administrator.