western gambling postcard playing poker playing cards artist william standing

Description

rare 1930's artist signed western gambling postcard playing poker western style. lower right corner artist signed. this was the first printing of this postcard. it was printed by western stationery co. at poplar Montana. the poker western style lettering is different from the ones later printed and the back has western stationery mark . i also have listed the later version of this postcard listed. most collectors do not know this information. this is a very rare find to find the first printing.William Standing was born near the settlement of Oswego on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation on July 27, 1904. From an early age of six years, Standing reported that he had been drawing and modeling in clay. His first attempt at a formal work was in 1916, when he was twelve years old. He produced pen and ink drawings from a photograph of how Wolf Point got its name. During the Depression years, William Standing did many pen and ink drawings, mainly humorous of both the white man and the Indian. The drawings were made into post cards and were sold widely which helped support him.William was one of the five Kiowa Indians who became special students at the University of Oklahoma under the guidance of Oscar Jacobson during the 1920's. His formal education began in the boarding school of the Presbyterian Mission at Wolf Point, and culminated at the Haskell Institute in Kansas from 1920 to 1924.During his lifetime, William Standing did not do traditional Assiniboin paintings but still preferred the name of "Fire Bear." "It makes no difference to me. If people want me to sign a name on pictures in white man's way and buy more that is all right. But I'd rather be Fire Bear.William Standing lived in Oswego. Attached to his cabin, he had a sixteen foot by sixteen foot addition with three shelves on each of the three walls. He would mix up one color and go around the room applying that color as needed to each of the canvases on the shelves.At present he works for the Western Stationery Co. at Poplar, Montana, illustrating stationery with a western motif and making comic cards. In his spare time, Mr. Standing studies nature and his own people and looks to them for subject matter. His palette reflects his soul, and his soul relects his love for all living things.William Standing died on June 27, 1951. Standing was killed in an auto accident out of Zortman, Montana, in the company of another Indian, when the car he was driving rolled over three times and crushed his skull. "William Standing, noted Poplar Indian artist, was killed early Wednesday morning forty miles south of Malta when his automobile failed to make a turn on Highway 19. Killed with him was Mrs. Yolanda Fisher Buffalo.