Don Rosa - Early Life

Early Life

Don Rosa's grandfather, Gioachino Rosa, lived in Maniago, a town at the foot of the Alps in Northern Italy, in the province of Pordenone. He emigrated to Kentucky, United States around 1900, established a successful tile and terrazzo company, then returned to Italy to marry and start a family. In 1915 just after the birth of his son Ugo Rosa, Gioachino returned to Kentucky with his wife, two daughters and two sons. Ugo Rosa grew up and was later married in Kentucky. His wife was born to a German American father and a mother with both Scottish and Irish ancestry.

Don Rosa was born Keno Don Hugo Rosa on June 29, 1951 in Louisville, Kentucky. He was named after both his father and grandfather. Gioachino was called "Keno" for short. Don's father was named Ugo Dante Rosa, but used the name "Hugo Don" Rosa in America.

Don Rosa was exposed to comics at a very young age, as his 11-years-older sister was a comics hoarder, and had thousands of comics for Don to look at and later read. Rosa began drawing comics before being able to write. Until high school, of which he attended Saint Xavier High School in Louisville, Kentucky his featured characters were a large cast of stick figures featured in comedy-adventures like the Barks comics and old movies Don enjoyed most. He never tried to draw more than stick figures because the drawings, for him, were illustrations to get the story told. Only the story was important to him, not the actual drawings. His favorite comic books growing up were Uncle Scrooge by Western Publishing and Little Lulu comics from Dell Comics (Western Publishing), and his sister's collection of MAD comics and magazines. When he was 12 years old he also discovered and enjoyed the Superman titles by DC Comics of the editor Mort Weisinger period, drawn mostly by his favorite Superman artists Curt Swan and Kurt Schaffenberger. Shortly after starting to collect Superman comics he started to trade the collection of his older sister for Superman Comics. Since a comic book shop in his area traded 2 old comics for 1 new, he only had 2 Duck comics left from his sister's collection by the 70s, one of them being The Golden Helmet. When he became a serious collector of older comics, he particularly enjoyed the classic E.C. horror and science fiction comics of the 1950s, Will Eisner's The Spirit, Walt Kelly's Pogo, and most comics of the 1940s onward.

Rosa entered the University of Kentucky in 1969. He graduated in 1973 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in civil engineering.