Artist and author Glen Rounds was neither a tenderfoot nor a city slicker. He was the real deal of the nearly Wild West--though he wasn’t beyond telling a few tall tales, too, here and there. Born in a sod house in the Badlands of South Dakota, when he was just a babe he and his family traveled by covered wagon to the open spaces of Montana.
Spinning Tales for His Supper
Glen grew up on a horse ranch and worked as
a mule skinner, a cowboy, and a carnival artist, but eventually his talents took him into the big city—
Kansas City’s Art Institute where he studied for two years. In 1930, he moved to New York City and started taking night classes at the
Art Students League and tried to sell stories during the day. He would visit publishers’ houses to sell his work, arriving in the late morning so he could grab a free meal—a trick he managed by starting a good story and offering to finish it over lunch. His artistic style was spare and rather rough, but it was perfect for the often funny, sometimes somber stories he wove about the American West.
