He was an actual cowboy. Originally from Missouri, he headed west shortly after his marriage in 1910, got work on several cattle drives and wound up working as a cowhand at the Chowchilla Ranch in California's San Joaquin Valley. When the ranch was sold, he and several of his fellow cowboys--including future cowboy actors
Jack Montgomery and
Hank Bell--got on their horses and headed north looking for work. When they passed through the small town of Niles, they got work as cowboy extras in a film being shot by
Gilbert M. 'Broncho Billy' Anderson, whose studio Essanay Films was headquartered in Niles. Discovering that acting like a cowboy was much more lucrative--and safer--than actually BEING a cowboy, they headed south to Southern California to seek employment in the film industry there. The rest, as they say, is history.