Frederick Benjamin Gipson was born February 7, 1908, in Mason, Texas, where his parents were farmers. He grew up hunting and fishing and, for a time, wanted nothing more than to be a cowboy. After graduating from high school, he worked as a bookkeeper, goat herder, and bronco buster. When he was in his mid-twenties, he entered the University of Texas at Austin to major in journalism. While at the university, he developed his talent for writing, and published his first short story, "HardPressed Sam," in the Southwest Review.

Before graduating, Gipson left the university to work full-time for a newspaper. In 1940 he married Tommie Eloise Wynn; they had two sons, Mike and Beck.

For several years, Gipson worked for different newspapers and wrote stories for inexpensively produced western magazines. These magazines, which flourished in the early twentieth century, specialized in sentimental, formulaic stories about the...