Actor, director Ron Howard visits Oklahoma birthplace

DUNCAN, Okla. – Oscar-winning director and actor Ron Howard returned to his home state of Oklahoma and the now-closed hospital where he was born.

Howard’s Instagram site this week featured a photo of him outside the shuttered building in Duncan, 75 miles (120.7 kilometres) southwest of Oklahoma City.

Howard wrote that his father was in the Air Force and stationed in Biloxi, Mississippi, and his mother preferred to give birth in her hometown of Duncan. Howard said he never lived in Duncan but feels “a connection to the town & people.”

The family later moved to California where Howard’s father, Rance Howard, was an actor. His mother, Jean Speegle Howard, also acted. Both appeared in some of their son’s movies, including “Cocoon” and “Apollo 13.”

Jean Howard died in 2000. Rance Howard died in 2017.