Jo won a music scholarship to Wichita State University, but after a year, transferred to the University of Kansas to study art.  
There she met Wally Sickbert, and they were married after his service with the United States Marines in 1951. 
 
Jo did technical illustrations for Beechcraft Inc. in the early 1950s.  
She and Wally had two children.  They lived in Paola, Kansas when Jo began painting in the late 1950s.  

The family moved to the Chicago area in 1967, where Jo developed her highly detailed primitive style, focused on depicting Victorian America. 
Some called her style “sophisticated primitive”. 
Her work was widely shown in the 1970s, including multiple private shows at Jack O’Grady Galleries in Chicago, IL and Scottsdale, AZ, and Johnson-Welch Galleries in Kansas City, MO. 

She also had private shows in galleries in Tokyo, Japan, Estes Park, CO, Overland Park, KS, Lincoln, NE, and Council Bluff, IA. 
A Jo Sickbert painting was included in the Chicago Tribune Bicentennial Art exhibition.  Jo did commercial art for Suntory Wine, Johnson Wax, and Campbell Soup.  
She did Christmas cards for Caspari, and for banks and several charities. 
Jo’s art was featured on covers for several children books and magazines, including the cover of the August 1973 Saturday Evening Post.