My mother read us the stories of Arthur and Lancelot before I was 7 -- I knew what that red dragon in the sky portended looooong before I studied it in college! My great-great aunt lived with us after my father died (I was 5) and she'd tell us stories of Jesse and Frank (she met Frank once, after his pardon) and told us stories of his life in Montana. Of course, the uncles threw in as well.

Some of the stories may have be slightly exaggerated (I don't think my Uncle Gene ended the Pacific War all by himself) but they were great fodder for kids.

By the time I was out of grammar school I'd read Edith Hamilton's "Mythology" several times and had a nodding acquaintance with Caesar, Homer, "The Aeniad", the Norse gods and goddesses, and Thucydides. (Also quite a few comic books and library books.) Naturally, when I got to college I'd forgotten the stuff when I needed it!