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Russell, C. M., pen/ink drawing, Running Warrior, 4" x 6 3/4"

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Western Americana Start Price:NA
Russell, C. M., pen/ink drawing, Running Warrior,  4  x 6 3/4
Russell, C. M., pen/ink drawing, Running Warrior, 4" x 6 3/4". Charles Marion Russell was born on March 19, 1864 in St. Louis, Missouri, a bustling gateway to the West of some 200,000 people. Family history and adventure stories such as the Leatherstocking Tales by James Fenimore Cooper lured Russell to the West. On a crisp March day in 1880 Charles M. Russell jumped off the stagecoach in Helena, Montana Territory and took his turn as the latest easterner seeking western adventure. Accompanying him was Willis L.W. “Pike” Miller, a family acquaintance who acted as Russell’s guardian and gave him his first job in Montana on a sheep ranch Miller owned in the Judith Basin. While Miller was kind enough to chaperone Russell, they soon parted ways because Russell wanted nothing to do with sheepherding.

For twelve years Russell and his horse Monte were together on the open range mainly nighthawking—somewhat of a lowly cowboy job of watching the horses overnight while the rest of the cowboys slept—until 1893 when Russell began transitioning from cowboy artist to full-time artist. Only a teenager, Russell was younger than most cowboys who were usually in their early twenties but shared with them the qualities of being gregarious, humble, energetic and adventuresome. Charlie saw the cowboy as the last frontiersman—unlike the colorless overburdened farmer and sheep herder.