William Oktavec, a Chec immigrant began painting window screens in Baltimore city in 1912. He owned and operated a produce store on the east side of the city populated by many other immigrants from Poland, Germany, Italy, Ireland and hosts of other ethnics new to this country. As with many new citizens of the day, he had been forced into the trades in order to survive in his new homeland. But his real love and ambition was art. Without air conditioning and decent refrigeration the hot summers of old Baltimore played havoc on his produce displayed outside of his store. So Bill began painting apples, oranges, bananas, cabbages etc on his store window screens and moved his produce inside, out of the hot sweltering sun. Recognizing his talent this soon elicited requests from his friends, neighbors and customers to paint their home window screens, usually with scenes from their old country. Thus began the famous red roof bungelow which remains a fovorite to this day.