Cover Art Description:
On the front cover, Charles M. Russell's Free Trapper (1911,
oil on canvas, 33" x 24") shows a quintessential western figure, the
independent fur trapper. The free trapper's experience is described by Frank
Bird Linderman in "Learning a Trapper's and Hunter's Art," his
autobiographical story set in northwestern Montana in 1885. Company
trappers, like those described those in Rich Aarstad's discussion of Pierre
Menard's 1810 letter to his Missouri Fur Company partner Pierre Chouteau
appear in the background of Russell's painting. Free Trapper is part of the
Montana Historical Society Museum Mackay Collection.
On the back cover is Mountain Lion, by Olaf C. Seltzer (no date, watercolor,
5 1/8" x 7 13/16"), a gift of the Greater Montana Foundation to the Montana
Historical Society Museum in 2006.
Copyright Montana The Magazine of Western History, Montana Historical Society. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission is prohibited.
