Verne Bright was born in 1893. He attended Pacific Lutheran University after serving in Siberia during World War I. During the Depression he was the supervisor of the professional and service divisions of the Works Progress Administration. During World War II he worked in the shipyards in Portland, Oregon, and after the war he worked as a newspaper reporter, freelance writer, the assistant postmaster of Aloha, and the assistant curator of the Oregon Historical Society. He was a prolific poet, published in the North American Poetry Review, Saturday Evening Post, Poetry, London Poetry Review, the New York Times, but probably best known for his 1948 book Mountain Man, which earned him an honorary doctorate in letters from Pacific Lutheran University, where he taught for two years. Bright passed away in 1977 in Oregon.