Deception Trail

Fred Grove was born on the fourth of July 1913, in Hominy, Oklahoma, the fourth of five children. Grove earned his B.A. degree in journalism from the University of Oklahoma, graduating in 1937, where he was sports editor of the student daily during his senior year. He later served as sports editor for two daily newspapers before drifting into general news and desk work.

Grove had attempted to write Westerns after Word War II, and interviewed many Oklahoma pioneers while working as a reporter for the Shawnee Morning News. He sold his first short story, "The Hangrope Ghost," to .44 Western magazine in 1951. He taught beginning reporting and worked in public relations at the University of Oklahoma, where he had taken creative writing courses from Foster Harris and Walter Campbell. Grove later served as Public Information Director of the Oklahoma Education Television Authority.

Flame of the Osage was his first book, published when he was forty-five. He had previously sold Western short stories to pulp magazines and Boy's Life during the 1950s. In addition to his five Spur awards from Western Writers of America, Fred Grove has received the Saddleman, the first Oklahoma Writing Award, and two Western Heritage awards from the National Cowboy Hall of Fame.

Grove died on September 11, 2008, after a long battle with cancer. He was 95. 030