A constant reader, Guthrie tried to write while in high school, "fiction pretty much, some essays, but I majored in journalism. My father had been a newspaper man for four years in this little town in Kentucky, and I guess he thought it was the way to become a writer".[3]:3
In 1919, Guthrie studied at the University of Washington for a year, then transferred to the University of Montana, where he was a member of Phi Sigma Kappa fraternity[4] and graduated with a degree in journalism with honors in 1923.[5] He worked odd jobs for the next few years.[5]
In 1926, Guthrie took out a $300 bank loan and moved to Lexington, Kentucky,[2]: 70 where he took a job at the Lexington Leader newspaper.[2]: 77 For the next 21 years he worked as a reporter, the city editor, and an editorial writer for the Leader.[5][6] Guthrie published his first novel Murders at Moon Dance in 1943.[2]: 128 [6][7]
In 1944, while still at the Leader, Guthrie won the Nieman Fellowship from Harvard,[5][8] and spent the year at the university studying writing.[6] While at Harvard he made friends with English professor Theodore Morrison,[2]: 104 "who knew so much about writing, probably more than I ever will."[3]:3 Morrison mentored Guthrie and helped him transition from journalism to fiction.[6][9]
During his year at Harvard Guthrie began his novel The Big Sky, which was published in 1947.[6][9] Guthrie later wrote, "It wasn't until I went to Harvard that I got in gear. Then I went back and worked for the newspaper for another year or so."[3]:4
At the Lexington Leader Guthrie's boss was very understanding and as long as Guthrie performed his news duties satisfactorily he was allowed to take his afternoons off to write fiction.[3]:18 After publication of The Big Sky Guthrie left the paper and supported himself by teaching creative writing at University of Kentucky.[5] During this time he published The Way West which won the 1950 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.[6][10] He quit teaching in 1952 to devote his full-time to writing,[5] and moved back to Choteau, Montana, because he said it was his "point of outlook on the universe".[3]: 8 He split his residence between Choteau and Great Falls, Montana, an hour away from Choteau.[11]
Guthrie continued to write predominantly western subjects. He worked for a time in Hollywood, writing the screenplays for Shane (1953, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award) and The Kentuckian (1955).[5]
His other books included These Thousand Hills (1956), The Blue Hen's Chick (1965), Arfive (1970), The Last Valley (1975), Fair Land, Fair Land (1982), Murder in the Cotswolds (1989), and A Field Guide to Writing Fiction (1991).[5][6] His first collection of short stories, The Big It and Other Stories, was published in 1960.[5]
Guthrie died in 1991, at age 90, at his ranch near Choteau.[5][6]
