Roland spent his childhood in a multi-generational home owned by his maternal grandmother in Edgebrook, Chicago, Illinois.  He attended kindergarten at the Sauganash school and then the remainder of the primary grades at the Edgebrook school.  He then attended Carl Schurz High School until part-way through his Sophomore year, when his family moved to Wheatridge, Colorado, just west of Denver.  He graduated from Wheatridge High in 1950