Born in Dithmarschen, Germany, Herman Hansen created meticulous watercolors expressive of by-gone days of the Old West, its horses, cowboys, and others passing through.

As a youngster, his imagination was stirred by James Fenimore Cooper's novel "Leather Stocking Tales" of the rugged life in the American West. His father, a rector and draftsman who encouraged his son's talent, sent him at age 16 to Hamburg, Germany to study with a painter of military battles and another who did detailed still lifes. In 1876, he studied in England for a year and learned a meticulous graphics style which determined his photo real western genre. Hearing stories of the American West sparked his imagination, and he emigrated to New York City in 1877.
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