When Rawls was fifteen, the United States economy entered a depression, prompting his family to leave their Oklahoma home for California; however, the family's convertible broke down near Albuquerque, New Mexico, where Rawls's father found a job.

 

As an adult during the 1930s and 1940s, Rawls became a carpenter and traveled to South America, Canada and Alaska. He wrote five manuscripts during this period, including WHERE THE RED FERN GROWS. Rawls's original manuscripts contained many spelling, grammar errors and no punctuation. Because of this, he kept the manuscripts hidden in a trunk in his father's workshop.

 

Even though Rawls's novels received much praise, he was perhaps most influential as a motivational speaker. Rawls visited 2,000 schools in twenty-two states before being diagnosed with cancer in 1983. Although Rawls and his wife had no children, he felt that he had many children in his fans. He once commented, "Children are always asking me what advice I can give them on trying to be a writer. I always tell them to do a lot of reading, read and study creative writing, then start writing and keep writing and then they can be a writer too. Someday they will make it if they don’t give up."

 

The only audience of his first sand-scribbled stories was his pet, a Bluetick Coonhound.

Wilson Rawls