For some ten years beginning in 1896, W. R. Leigh worked as a commercial illustrator based in New York. His illustrations appeared in popular magazines of that time, as well as in several books. Leigh's genius in both visual arts and writing came together in his masterpiece of the two arts, The Western Pony, published in 1933.

William Robinson Leigh was the fifth of seven children born to William Leigh and Mary White Colston Leigh at Maidstone, the family estate in Berkeley County, West Virginia. Leigh's father sailed for twenty years on a man-of-war in the United States Navy before retiring in 1854 in favor of agricultural pursuits. Leigh's mother was descended from colonial Virginians, and Leigh counted Thomas Jefferson and John Marshall as maternal relatives. Jefferson was a distant cousin, and Marshall was the brother of Leigh's great-grandmother. Leigh often included Pocahontas and Sir Walter Raleigh in his family tree...