Visitors to the black neighborhood of Montgomery, Alabama, in 1940 would have been treated to an unexpected sight. In front of the Ross-Clayton Funeral Parlor, in a chair next to the Coca-Cola cooler, sat a massive, dignified old man with a board across his lap, drawing. He never stopped. On his small pieces of cardboard sprang to life a world of chicken stealing, hunting, plowing, preaching, drinking, arguing and testifying, as well as many vivid representations of the animal world.

In only three years, between 1939 and 1942, Bill Traylor—former slave, factory worker, and homeless welfare recipient, who slept on a wooden pallet inside the funeral home—created his own extraordinary history of drawing in 1,800 images. Most were preserved by his friend and fellow artist, Charles Shannon. Traylor was black, Shannon white.

Most of what we know about Traylor we owe to Shannon, who provided him with materials and encouragement. Traylor was born a slave on the Traylor plantation near Benton, Alabama, around 1854 and worked there a field hand until he left for Montgomery. Welfare records indicate that he may have been in Montgomery as early as 1936. He probably began drawing not long before Shannon first saw him. His technique developed rapidly from the use of simple geometric shapes like triangles to complex abstract constructions peopled with tiny multiple figures in motion.

Once he began, he worked every day, following the same routine among the jugs of kerosene and sacks of feed his friends had left him to guard, drawing and painting the animals and scenes he remembered from his rural days and the characters in the street around him.

Traylor’s work was interpreted in 1942 when he went to stay in several northern cities with his children, none of whom seemed to know what to do with him. During that period he did little, if any, drawing. Upon his return to Montgomery in 1946, he found that everything he knew had changed. He became ill and lost a leg to gangrene. The social agency that supplied his welfare check discovered a daughter living in Montgomery and insisted he live with her. Unhappy in his new situation, Traylor lost the desire to work.

He died in a nursing home, a few days after summoning Charles Shannon for a final visit. Shannon arranged for a showing of Traylor’s work in Montgomery and in 1941 had his drawings taken to the Museum of Modern Art. After Traylor’s death, Shannon began a prolonged effort to bring that work to the public. Today Traylor’s work is regarded as among the major triumphs of self-taught art and is featured in numerous publications.