LOUIS L'AMOUR 
March 22, 1908 - June 10, 1988

"Westerns have always been regarded in this country as second rate literature. I didn't agree with that. I decided... I was going to write damn good Westerns and I would make them accurate. I would show them that Westerns could be history, that they were important."

~ His father held several occupations: a salesman, a veterinarian, a police chief and a teacher.

~ His mother was a teacher and an amateur poet.

~ When Louis was a boy, his older sister became a librarian, thus introducing Louis to the world of books at a very early age.

~ He read Longfellow, Whittier, Lowell and Emerson. Later on, growing frustrated by the slow pace of his teachers, Louis began to educate himself on all topics, via the printed word.

~ Louis also had the chance to learn about history firsthand when his grandfather moved into a little house nearby. The old veteran would recount to Louis his experiences as a soldier in the Civil and Indian wars.

~ At one point, Louis' father served as a state livestock inspector, and Louis got to meet cowboys coming through town on the Northern Pacific Railroad, stockcars full of cattle.

~ Louis dropped out of school in the 10th grade, but always maintained a thirst for knowledge. No matter where he lived, he searched out the local library and bookstores.

~ As an adult, Louis worked a variety of jobs: boxer, elephant handler, circus hand, lumberjack and a seaman. But he knew deep down he was meant to be a writer.

~ He finally took some creative writing courses at the University of Oklahoma, but every story he submitted was rejected.

~ He tried his hand at poetry, and soon appeared in several magazines under the name of Louis L'Amour. But he quickly realized he couldn't make a living writing poetry.

~ Two years later, he sold a short story called "Anything for a Pal" to pulp magazine True Gang Life. He made less than eight bucks, but he decided to commit to this type of writing.

~ After the war, he returned home ready to write. He published stories in pulp magazines of all types, from detective and adventure magazines to sports.

~ He didn't plan to focus on westerns, but the genre was hot at the time and he possessed enough historical knowledge and childhood memories to fill up many books.

~ In 1953 he published his first novel, Hondo. It was quickly made into a movie, starring John Wayne.

~ In 1956 Louis married Katherine Elizabeth Adams, an actress who had appeared in the TV shows Gunsmoke and Death Valley Days. He married at the age of forty-eight and would go on to father two children.

~ Louis usually wrote five pages a day, including Sundays and holidays. In his book-filled study, he owned biographical material on thousands of gunfighters. Rising around 5:30 each day, he read newspapers, ate breakfast, then went straight to work at his IBM Wheelwriter. At noon he stopped for lunch, then returned to his work for another hour or so. He typed with two fingers, and asked wife Kathy to proofread all his work.

~ Louis L'Amour was the first novelist to be awarded a Congressional Gold Medal. In 1984 he also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian award.

~ In the summer of 1987 Louis caught pneumonia. Tests showed the non-smoker had lung cancer.

~ A year later, he passed away in Los Angeles, California, right after learning that sales of his books had topped two hundred million.

~ He is buried at Forest Lawn in Glendale, California.

~ Louis L'Amour wrote more than a hundred novels in his thirty-year career. His books have been translated into dozens of languages and made into over 30 films. He left behind many more stories, which his family continues to release in print.