Robert Redford says he worked at Yosemite National Park before making it in Hollywood, inspired by his first visit when he had 'a mild case of polio' | Fortune

"I had a mild case of polio-not enough to put me in an iron lung, but enough to keep me bedridden for weeks. As I came out of it, my mom wanted to do something for me. She realized that, growing up in the city, I'd missed out on a lot of nature."

"So she drove me to Yosemite. If you're coming from Fresno, you go through a mile-long tunnel, and when we came out the other side, I was blown away,"

"We stopped to look at the view, and when I went to the edge-well, I said to myself, 'I don't want to look at this. I want to be in this.'"

Robert Redford died at age 89 in his Utah home. He gained fame for roles in films such as Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and All the President's Men and launched the Sundance Film Festival. A childhood trip to Yosemite after a polio illness sparked a deep love of nature. He later returned and spent two summers working at Camp Curry (now Curry Village) and Yosemite Valley Lodge. Redford grew up in a working-class family in Santa Monica and spent decades as a climate activist, founding The Redford Center with his late son James in 2005.

Read at Fortune