David Rheem Jarrett was born and raised in Berkeley, California.  He attended Berkeley High School, graduating in 1959.  Entering U.C. Berkeley at the age of seventeen, he promptly flunked out after three semesters.  After a year of working at menial jobs and having an older fellow worker telling him to “use his head, not his hands,” he decided to reinstate himself with the educational establishment, ultimately receiving his D.D.S. degree from the U.C. San Francisco School of Dentistry.   He has always loved being outdoors, and spends as much time there as he can.  With a fly rod in his hand and a gun on his hip, he's happy.  He worked at many different jobs during the long ascent of the academic ladder, most of them physically challenging, and the experience gained while doing these has proven invaluable in his life and in his writing, as has the interaction he had with patients during his thirty-five years practicing dentistry.   He met his wife, Kathie, when she brought him a cup of coffee during his relief from fighting a forest fire in Tuolumne County, California in 1959.  They have been together ever since, camping, fishing, and playing golf together, and recently celebrated fifty-one years of marriage.  Three grown children and several grandchildren will attest to the fact that their marriage has been a happy one!