If Catlin was the painter of the American Indian, and Bierstadt the portrayer of the Rocky Mountains, the artist of the Western cowboys and settlers was Frederic Remington. Born in Canton, New York, the son of a wealthy publisher, Remington was a boxer and a football player at Yale—the last name one would expect to become the artist of the old west. But as a boy he loved horses, and fed on the journals of George Catlin and Lewis and Clark. At the age of nineteen, he left college to look for adventure. He traveled form Montana to Texas, as a cow puncher and prospector. Remington had always been interested in journalism. Now he began to write down, and to paint and sketch what he saw. The subject of "Winning of the West" so fascinated the East that magazines and newspapers were crammed with accounts of the prospector"s adventures, and of battles with rustlers and other outlaws—all the tales that were then news and have since become legends in American history.
There are also stories contributed by Bret Harte, Richard Harding Davis, Joaquin Miller, and many more. Often these were illustrated by sketches and paintings from Remington"s hand, but it was as a sculptor that Remington was the greatest artist.The writer"s purpose in the passage is to ______.
