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1916 - 2010
William Taylor Moyers, was born in Atlanta, Georgia in 1916, and came to Colorado’s San Luis Valley in 1931, growing up on the F. R. Swift ranch north of Alamosa. While in school, he toured the area competing in local rodeos. He graduated from Adams State College in 1939, and then attended art school at the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles, California. Prior to World War II, Bill was employed by Walt Disney studios as an animator, working on such classic films as “Fantasia”. With the outbreak of World War II, Bill served as a US Army Signal Corps captain in the South Pacific and the Philippines. In 1943, he married Neva Anderson, who he met in college, and who was then serving as a US Naval Officer. After the war, Bill and Neva established their home in Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, where Bill began a career as a successful illustrator and author. After a move to Georgia and summers in Colorado, Bill and Neva moved to Albuquerque in 1962 where Bill painted and sculpted western subjects full-time. Over the years, he received numerous awards and recognition for his artwork, beginning with the American Artist award in 1945 for his illustrations for the western novel, The Virginian. He later received numerous awards from the prestigious Cowboy Artists Association, a group for which he served as a longtime member and four-term president.
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