John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr., was born on February 27, 1902, in Salinas, California, to a father, John Ernst Steinbeck, who had settled in California shortly after the Civil War, and a mother, Olive Hamilton Steinbeck, who was a public schoolteacher. Steinbeck grew up in the beautiful, fertile Salinas Valley, and most of his memorable novels and short stories would be set in California. Situated between the Santa Lucia range and the Gabilan Mountains, this valley in west central California is bordered on the north by Monterey Bay and on the south by San Luis Obispo. During his early years, Steinbeck's mother read to him from books such as Treasure Island and Robin Hood. Young John grew up hearing the rhythms of the Bible and listening to the magical stories of the Round Table from Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur. He would return again and again to those early influences for symbols and themes.
During these early years, John's home was comfortable, and his father often drove the boy and his two sisters around the valley where they saw the workers and field hands in their poor shacks. This early impression of the workers' lifestyles was added to later memories when Steinbeck spent time with these workers as an adult. As a youngster, he also explored the caves and swimming holes around Salinas and watched the changes of seasons. His abiding love of nature and his thoughts about man's relationship to his environment are present in most of his works.
In high school, Steinbeck did well in English and edited the school yearbook. He worked at various jobs and one in particular — as a ranch hand on some of the local ranches — later led him to images used in Of Mice and Men. Steinbeck graduated from high school and went on to Stanford University. Even though he remained at Stanford until 1925, he never graduated. While in college, he continued to write creatively, and he worked for a time on neighboring farms, especially Spreckels Sugar Ranch. The agricultural industry at this time relied on cheap, transient labor. It was during this time that Steinbeck met many of the types of people described with compassion in his later writing.
