Russell began using the buffalo skull in his work very early in his career, initially as an object in the foreground of his watercolors and paintings. In the beginning, he used a more realistic version of the skull that seems to have derived, at least in part, from similar signatures by illustrators of western subjects that appeared in the pages of Harper’s Weekly, which Russell is known to have read. By the 1890s the skull had become part of his signature, and the rendering of the buffalo skull had become much more linear and schematic. By the turn of the century he had perfected the rendering to a few well-articulated lines that became quite distinctive. One of Russell’s Great Falls friends, W.T. Ridgeley, who owned a printing company that reproduced a number of Russell’s works for sale, advised the artist in 1906 to copyright the skull as a trademark. This pencil drawing, originally part of the Mint Saloon collection, may have been used in the display of Russell’s work. A pen drawing of a buffalo skull adorned the top of Russell’s official stationery.