the time it never rained by elmer kelton

After two initial years, Kelton’s educational pursuits were brought to a halt as he enlisted in the U.S. He attended a local highschool in the city of Crane and went on to pursue higher education at the University of Texas. His mother was Neta Beatrice and his father was Robert William. He spent his childhood in this and several other ranches. This ranch stays just east of Andrews, Texas and it belonged to the Scharbauer Cattle Company. He was born in 1926 on a place named Horse Camp in Five Wells Ranch. “He Created a New Kind of Western.” Wall Street Journal, November 24, 2009.Elmer Kelton -who also used the pseudonyms Tom Early, Alex Hawk, and Lee McElroy- was a well-known journalist and a prolific writer best known for his western novels. Sandhills Boy: The Winding Trail of a Texas Writer. Denton: University of North Texas Press, 1989. Elmer Kelton and West Texas: A Literary Relationship. Fort Worth: Texas Christian University Press, 2011.Īlter, Judy. Men by Book Table.Īlter, Judy and James Ward Lee, eds. Lawrence Clayton the Dean of Arts and Sciences at HSU, and Dr.

Don Graham from UT Austin, Elmer Kelton the San Angelo novelist, Dr.

The Time It Never Rained is now remembered as his finest work, and a lasting contribution to Texas literary history.Ĭopy negative of four men standing behind a book table at the Moody Center at HSU at a luncheon in honor of Elmer Kelton. In 1995, Kelton was voted the 'greatest western writer of all time' by the Western Writers of America. I write about people five feet eight and nervous.” Kelton once explained, “I can’t write about heroes seven feet tall and invincible.

His 1973 novel The Time It Never Rained, set in the drought-stricken Texas of the 1950s, ushered in a new kind of Western-one concerned with the modern day rather than a bygone era of pioneers and cattle drives. But he also wrote fiction, and gradually gained fame as an authentic voice of Western literature. Instead, he enrolled at The University of Texas in Austin, majoring in journalism.Īfter serving in the army during World War II, Kelton returned to Texas to work as an editor for farm and ranch journals. Young Elmer, with his poor eyesight and love of books, realized he would never become the cowboy his father wanted him to be. The Time it Never Rainedīorn in 1926, Kelton grew up on the McElroy ranch near Midland, where his father was the general manager. These were qualities that Kelton knew well, having spent his entire life in the region. X A downtown mural, by western artist Stylle Read, in San Angelo, the seat of Tom Green County, TexasĪuthor of more than forty Westerns, the writer Elmer Kelton depicted the South Texas Plains with both romance and realism.

The time it never rained by elmer kelton