Solon H. Borglum (1868-1922), the son of Danish Mormon emigrants, became a world-famous sculptor whose years on his family’s Nebraska ranch helped shape his art. After his family moved from Utah to Omaha and Fremont during his childhood, his father, James H. Borglum, bought land west of Cairo, Nebraska, in 1883, then moved the family to California, where Solon worked as a cowboy. When the family returned to Omaha in 1885, Solon briefly studied painting before taking charge of his father’s cattle ranch in the South Loup Valley at age seventeen, managing it from 1885 to 1893. While there he began making sketches, including blizzard scenes in 1891. In 1890 his older brother John Gutzon Borglum visited the ranch and urged him to pursue art full time. Solon left Nebraska in 1893 to study art in California, Cincinnati, Ohio, and Paris, France, where he abandoned painting for sculpture. The works that earned him the title “Sculptor of the Prairie,” many depicting cowboys, horses, and Indians, drew inspiration from his Nebraska ranching experiences.