page_title: Early life and work of Clint Eastwood
section_title: Early life
hierarchical_section_title: Early life and work of Clint Eastwood / Early life
caption_attribution_description: English: The front of Oakland Technical High School, facing southwest
context_page_description: Clint Eastwood was born May 31, 1930 in San Francisco, California to Clinton Eastwood Sr. and Margaret Ruth.
context_section_description: He was a large baby at 11 lb 6 oz (5.16 kg) and was named "Samson" by the nurses at the St. Francis Hospital. Eastwood has English, Scottish, Dutch and Irish ancestry. The elder of two siblings, he has a younger sister, Jeanne Bernhardt, born in 1934. His father worked as a salesman and briefly a detective in San Francisco, according to U.S. Census records, and at different jobs along the West Coast during the 1930s. In 1940, the Eastwoods settled in Piedmont, California and did not move again until after Clint reached adulthood. Eastwood often drops references to the Great Depression in interviews, implying that he comes from a poor family, but according to Sondra Locke, "Actually they were never poor, they lived in a very wealthy part of town, had a swimming pool, belonged to the country club, and each drove his own car."
  Eastwood was a weak student and records indicate he had to attend summer school. He was held back at Piedmont Junior High School due to poor academic scores, and later attended Piedmont High School from January 1945 to at least January 1946. Despite his athletic and musical talents, Eastwood shunned school teams and the band. He was told he would make a good basketball player, but he was interested in individual pursuits like tennis and golf, a passion he retains today. He transferred to Oakland Technical High School, where the drama teachers encouraged him to take part in school plays, but was not interested. According to Eastwood, all he had on his mind were "fast cars and easy women". He took auto mechanic courses and studied aircraft maintenance, rebuilding both aircraft and car engines. Eastwood also became a pianist; according to a friend, he "would actually play the piano until his fingers were bleeding". He was scheduled to graduate in January 1949 as a midyear graduate, although it is not clear if he ever did. Biographer Patrick McGilligan notes that high school graduation records are a matter of strict legal confidentiality. "Clint graduated from the airplane shop. I think that was his major," joked classmate Don Kincaid. Another high school friend, Don Loomis, echoed "I don't think he was spending that much time at school because he was having a pretty good time elsewhere." "I think what happened is he just went off and started having a good time. I just don't think he finished high school," explained Fritz Manes, a boyhood friend two years younger than Eastwood, who remained associated with him until their falling out in the mid-1980s.
  By early 1949 his father moved to a plant in Seattle. Eastwood moved in with a friend in Oakland named Harry Pendleton. He was invited to a house party in Malibu, where he met the film director Howard Hawks who, with John Ford, would influence his career. Eastwood rejoined his family in Seattle, where he worked at the Weyerhaeuser Company pulp mill in Springfield, Oregon with his father. He worked briefly as a lifeguard after obtaining a certificate from a Red Cross course, and played ragtime piano at a bar in Oakland.
caption: Oakland Technical High School
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