Bernard Riley was born in 1911 and spent his childhood on the colorful streets of the proud, working-class neighborhood in Bridgeport Connecticut. One thinks of his adventuresome youth as something like a Huck Finn. The winter quarters of the Barnum and Bailey circus was in the next block. per-forming, and he managed to earn a few dollars by gilding the acrobats. 

At Bridgeport's Central High School he became an industrious designer and builder of stage sets for the school's prize-winning plays. Riley painted signs, illustrated catalogues, arranged window displays, cartooned for local newspapers, and put his hands on anything offering a creative challenge. He felt lucky to land a temporary job as a lab technician during the pit of the Great Depression. He spent the next 41 years working forty hours per week at Handy and Harman in Fairfield, Connecticut, yet without sacrificing the precious time for his art. For 20 years he painted in a damp basement, in 1965 he designed and constructed a studio attached to his garage

While he was stationed at the Philadelphia Naval Hospital during World War II, Riley taught art to returning amputees as a part of their rehabilitation. He credits the Navy for sending him to Temple University where he was trained in surgical  anatomy for purposes of physical therapy. In his daily activities working with the handicapped, and from his anatomical studies with cadavers, Riley feels he gained a solid grounding in classical anatomy.

With no formal training, he first started painting the scenes he knew from the south side of Bridgeport - the rather tattered newsboys with their mongrel dog in front of an old building, the short-order counter or bar lit up of a dark evening, 

In 1938 he married Marie Roder, they remained married until his death. In 1948 they had a son John