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William MacLeod Raine (June 22, 1871 – July 25, 1954) was a British-born Americannovelist who wrote fictional adventure stories about theAmerican Old West.
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In 1959, he was inducted into theHall of Great Westerners of theNational Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum.[1]
William MacLeod Raine was born inLondon, the son of William and Jessie Raine. After his mother died, his family migrated from England toArkansas when Raine was ten years old, eventually settling on a cattle ranch near theTexas-Arkansas border. In 1894, after graduating fromOberlin College, Raine left Arkansas and headed for the western U.S. He became the principal of a school inSeattle while contributing columns to a local newspaper. Later he moved toDenver, where he worked as a reporter and editorial writer for local periodicals, including theRepublican, thePost, and theRocky Mountain News.
At this time he began to publish short stories, eventually becoming a full-time free-lance fiction writer, and finally finding his literary home in the novel. His earliest novels were romantic histories taking place in the English countryside. However, after spending some time with theArizona Rangers, Raine shifted his literary focus and began to utilize the American West as a setting. The publication ofWyoming in 1908 marks the beginning of his prolific career, during which time he averaged nearly two western novels a year until his death in 1954. In 1920 he was awarded an M.L. degree from theUniversity of Colorado, where he had established that school's first journalism course.
During theFirst World War 500,000 copies of one of his books were sent to British soldiers in the trenches. Twenty of his novels have been filmed. Though he was prolific, he was a slow, careful, conscientious worker, intent on accurate detail, and considered himself a craftsman rather than an artist.
In 1905 Raine married Jennie P. Langley, who died in 1922. In 1924 he married Florence A. Hollingsworth; they had a daughter. Though he traveled a good deal, Denver was considered his home.
In 1928, he ghost wrote withBilly Breakenridge, the bookHelldorado: Bringing Law to the Mesquite. Breakenridge had been a deputy sheriff underJohnny Behan inTombstone,Arizona Territory during the period of theGunfight at the O.K. Corral. Breakenridge had pressed Wyatt for details about his time in Tombstone to add to the book. It was published the year before Wyatt died.[2] and it depicted Wyatt as a thief, pimp, crooked gambler, and murderer.[3] The book stated that the Earps and Doc Holliday aggressively mistreated the guiltless cowboys until they were forced into a fatal confrontation.[4] His description of the 1881 O.K. Corral gun fight stated that the Clanton and McLaury brothers were merely cowboys who had been unarmed and surrendered but the Earp brothers had shot them in cold blood.[3] Wyatt and Josie protested that the book's contents was biased and more fiction than fact. Earp complained about the book until his death in January, 1929, and his wife continued in the same vein afterward.[4]: 36
Raine died on July 25, 1954, and is buried atFairmount Cemetery in Denver. He was posthumously inducted into the Hall of Great Westerners of the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1959.
