after, at the age of three years and nine months, the boy used his paints to produce an image he called "Arabian horses." He learned to ride on the family's pet horse, Old John. Following his mother's death, both of Davenport's grandmothers helped raise him. Timothy Davenport remarried in 1872, to Elizabeth "Nancy" Gilmour Wisner, and in 1873, the family moved to Silverton—the cartoonist later recounted that the move to the community, about south of Portland and with a population of 300 at the time, was so he "might live in the Latin Quarter of that village and inhale any artistic atmosphere that was going to waste". Homer began to study music, and was allowed to help Timothy clerk at the store the elder Davenport purchased when he first moved to Silverton. Timothy required Homer to milk the cows, but otherwise Homer was to "study faces and draw." He was well-liked by the villagers, but they considered him shiftless—they did not consider drawing to be real work. He exhibited an interest in animals, especially fast horses and fighting cocks. Davenport later wrote that his fascination with Arabian horses was reawakened in his adolescent years with his admiration of a picture of an Arabian-type horse found on an empty can of horse liniment. He carefully cleaned the can and kept it as his "only piece of artistic furniture" for many years until forced to leave it behind when he moved to San Francisco. He also played in the community band in his formative years, and with that group young Davenport once traveled as far as Portland. Davenport's initial jobs were not successful. His first position outside Silverton began when a small circus came to town, and Davenport, in his late teenage years, left with it. He was assigned as a clown and to care for the circus's small herd of horses, which he also sketched. He became disenchanted with the circus when he was told to brush the elephant's entire body with linseed oil, a difficult task. He left the tour and tried to succeed as a jockey, despite being tall. Other early positions included clerking in a store, working as a railway fireman, and being a stoker on the Multnomah. In 1889, Davenport attended the Mark Hopkins School of Art in San Francisco, California, where he was expelled after a month because of his cartooning; he returned to the school