Zane Grey was born Pearl Zane Grey on January 31, 1872 in Zanesville, Ohio to Lewis Grey and Alice Josephine (Zane) Grey. Growing up, he had the typical boyhood. He had a gang of friends, excelled in athletics, but was not interested in school work. Grey was a talented baseball player and was highly recruited by various colleges. Despite his dislike for academic life, he managed to earn a degree in dentistry from the University of Pennsylvania in 1896.

From 1898 to 1904 he lived in New York City and had an unsuccessful dentistry practice. It was unsuccessful primarily due to his lack of interest. At this time, he wrote his first book Betty Zane about his Ohio ancestors, which was rejected by numerous publishers and finally published by Grey himself. In 1904 he moved to Lackawaxen, Pennsylvania, where he met Lina Elise Roth. They were married in 1905. She was one of Grey's primary supporters of his efforts to become a professional writer.

In 1908, Grey accompanied Col. C.J. "Buffalo" Jones to the west. Grey was amazed by the stories of the colonel. As a result of the trip, he wrote The Last of the Plainsmen. From all the material he acquired during this trip, more novels were written. Grey was an avid outdoorsman who enjoyed fishing and hunting, and that outdoor life is portrayed in many of his books. He often enjoyed hunting along the Rogue River in Oregon. When he was not adventuring in the outdoors, he was writing at his home in Atlanta, Georgia.

Grey became famous for his western novels and literature. In his lifetime, he wrote well over sixty books as well as numerous short stories. His literature helped to create the idea of the Western as a literary genre. An acclaimed and highly-successful novelist, Grey died on October 23, 1939.