Cowboy Charlie: The Story of Charles M. Russell

by Jeanette Winter

Overview

The story of the great American painter of the Wild West, Charlie Russell.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781930900837
Publisher:	Purple House Press
Publication date:	03/01/2016
Edition description:	Reissue
Product dimensions:	10.10(w) x 7.40(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

JEANETTE WINTER has written and illustrated many books for children, including MAMA, The Librarian of Basra, Calavera Abecedario: A Day of the Dead Alphabet Book, My Name Is Georgia, and Josefina. She lives in New York City.

Editorial Reviews

Born in St. Louis "in the days when buffalo still roamed the West," Charlie dreams of being a cowboy. At 15, he travels to the Montana frontier, and there he spends the rest of his days, riding the range, hunting and trapping, even living with the Blood Indians for a time. Finally, after waves of settlers, ``Barbed-wire fences were everywhere. The great herds of buffalo were gone.'' Charlie retires to a log cabin studio and paints ``the story of the Wild West.'' In fact, Charlie is a historical figure, Charles M. Russell, whose paintings and sculptures are now exhibited in museums. Winter (Diego; Sleepy River) documents the cowpoke's career and the landscape he loved in a series of expansive portraits (including one four-page gatefold) that showcase her own unmistakable talent. Stylized, slightly primitive characters and settings are rendered in a wholly unexpected palette-mauve clouds float against a cantaloupe sky, sheep graze in a turquoise field-for an effect that's both timeless and cutting-edge. Ages 4-up. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

K-Gr 2-Through a young boy's dream of moving west and being a cowboy, Winter introduces Charles Russell, great American painter. Her stylized acrylics serve Charlie well, from pictures of his boyhood imaginings of frontier life to the realities of the wide, sprawling prairies teaming with wildlife to the bustling activities of the towns in the Old West and the cowhands. (One fold-out page is especially effective for the panoramic view, but will be delicate for young library users.) The author convincingly shows Russell's love for all prairie cultures, portraying his life with the Blood Indians with dignity and compassion. A final biographical note gives further information concerning honors Russell received and locations of his paintings. Large, horizontal spreads laced with spare text make Cowboy Charlie ideal for group sharing and independent daydreaming.-Claudia Cooper, Ft. Stockton Independent School District, TX

School Library Journal

A city boy from St. Louis, Charles Russell longed to be a cowboy in the Wild West. Ever drawing and sculpting images of his frontier heroes and the animals of the plains, the boy dreamed of being part of their wilderness life. In the hope of quelling their son's ambitions, Charles' parents sent him west for one month when he was a young teen. The month of his parent's intent extended to a lifetime of experiences with the Native Americans, cowboys, and land of the Old West--experiences Russell indelibly detailed in the lifelike paintings for which he became famous. Winter invitingly describes Russell's journey to the land and the occupation of his dreams in a concise text from which her distinctive folk art takes flight. In a rich palette of acrylics, Winter's illustrations convey the joy of a youth fulfilling his wildest ambitions and simultaneously preserving for posterity a record of the lost American frontier.

Ellen Mandel