Where the Red Fern Grows

Where the Red Fern Grows is a children's novel written by American author Wilson Rawls about a boy who buys and trains two Redbone Coonhound hunting dogs.   The author, Wilson Rawls, grew up in Oklahoma and although he always aspired to be a writer, he had little formal education and struggled greatly with spelling and punctuation. Eventually, with the help and encouragement of his wife, he hand wrote the manuscript for Where the Red Fern Grows in three weeks, from the memory of previous manuscripts he had burned because he was ashamed of them. The story was picked up by the Saturday Evening Post where it was published in a series titled “The Hounds of Youth”. Doubleday the published the book the same year, changing the name and attempting to market it to adults, although the author had specifically written it for children. When it was published in 1961, initial sales of the book were slow, although today it has sold over seven millions copies and is required reading in many schools.     t was made into a popular 1974 film starring Stewart Petersen, James Whitmore and Beverly Garland. The film was remade in 2003 and starred Joseph Ashton, Dabney Coleman, Ned Beatty and Dave Matthews. This book is a popular choice for early middle school reading classes, with a reading level appropriate to grades 4 and up. -

Read More: Identifying first editions of Where the Red Fern Grows

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