Freeman Owens was raised at 820 West 3rd Street, Pine Bluff, AR. The house is still standing today. He was the grandson of Arkansas Supreme Court Judge William M. Harrison, SR and Parmelia Harrison and the son of Christabel Harrison and Charles H. Owens. Owens joined the United States Marine Corps as a Quartermaster Sgt during WWI and received honorable discharge after 4 years.Freeman Harrison Owens was born in Pine Bluff, Arkansas on July 20, 1890 as the only child of Christabel Harrison and Charles H. Owens. He attended Pine Bluff High School in Pine Bluff, but quit in his senior year to work at a local movie theatre as a projectionist. He constructed his own 35mm movie camera at the age of 16, which took him two years to build. He was one of the first to film the "news" which was shown back in the movie theatres. Owens was one the first cameraman to capture on film the "Chicago Stock Yards Fire" in 1910 and the "Charleston, South Carolina Hurricane and Flood" in 1911. Owens had 11,812 inventions and 200 patents to his credit. He patented the method of adding synchronized sound to motion pictures, the A.C. Nielsen Rating System, plastic lens for Kodak and many others.