The Harryhausen Chronicles. Part3

Raymond Frederick Harryhausen was born on the 29th June 1920 in Los Angeles, California, USA, to parents Fred and Martha.
He had a passion, which has never abated, for dinosaurs and anything fantasy.
His parents both encouraged him to pursue what he wanted to, even if the chosen career wasn't what they would have probably considered usual. Ray commented, 'My obsession with fantasy has been lifelong, growing during my formative years and being taken to new heights by novels, paintings and of course films, and I was always encouraged by my parents. They nurtured this unusual passion in me by taking me to films and theatre, and later enthused about my experiments with marionettes, models and animation, eventually even helping me with productions. They never tried to discourage me in any way from my obsession, and could just as easily have said, 'Get out there and be a doctor or a lawyer or follow some other profession that is going to bring you in money'. Fortunately, they didn't'.
His favourite haunts as a child were museums, marionette shows, the ocean, local parks and movie houses.
It was whilst at Grammar school that he learnt how to make model miniature set pieces of Californian Missions. This took him to the next phase in which he began to make three dimensional figures and sets that of course led him to make his own versions of prehistoric creatures.
He discovered the LA County Museum where he marvelled at the murals of prehistoric creatures created by Charles R. Knight (1874-1953), particularly the one of the Le Brea Tar Pits which is still in situ.
Knight's visualisation of what dinosaurs looked like became the vision that Ray used throughout his career.
When he was eighteen years old Ray entered a competition called The Junior Museum Hobby Show at the County Museum in March/April of 1938, submitting a diorama that included his stegosaurus (based on Knight's paintings), which won first prize.