Jim is the youngest of eleven children and grew up on a farm near the small rural town of Metamora, Indiana. His parents started their life together just before the Great Depression, so the children were raised with thriftiness, honesty, and old-school discipline. They worked hard in the fields with manual labor but were clever and innovative enough to find time for hard play as well. They adopted many of their parents' values in their own adult life and were served well by them. That same family farm where they were raised still resides in the family over a hundred years after the grandparents settled there. Jim's love for the land led to him owning part of that farm for 52 years and still counting. He also owned much of the valley surrounding it for much of his life. Growing up and living with nature in those hills and that valley has provided the backdrop and powerful inspiration for much of his writing.