The Zane Grey's West Society was founded in 1983 by Joe Wheeler and is located in Pleasanton, California. The society's purpose is to promote the works and life of Zane Grey by furthering the knowledge and research on Grey and his works. As of 2022, the society was active.

Pearl Zane Gray was born January 31, 1872, in Zanesville, Ohio. The fourth of five children born to Lewis M. Gray, a dentist, and Josephine Alice Zane, his was an active boyhood marked by attendance at local schools and participation in many boyhood activities of which fishing and baseball were his favorites. After serving an apprenticeship with his father, he entered dental school at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia in 1892. He graduated in 1896. In 1900, he met his future wife and editor, Lina Elise Roth, known as Dolly. During their five-year courtship, Gray changed his name to Zane Grey (dropping his first name and changing the spelling of his last), gave up his dental practice, and began a career as an author. After receiving many rejections by publishers, on his own he published his first book, entitled Betty Zane (1903). He and Dolly were married the following year, making their first home in Lackawaxen, Pennsylvania. Grey's attention was drawn west to the geographic area which would provide the setting for most of his major books when he met Charles Jesse ("Buffalo") Jones in 1906. Jones took Grey to the American Southwest for the purpose of having Grey write a book about his life. Upon returning to the east, Grey expressed his sentiments in The Last of the Plainsmen, a book about Jones. In 1910, he published Heritage of the Desert, and in 1912 Riders of the Purple Sage. These two books were his first major successes in literature and the ones by which he established his national reputation as an author. His greatest sustained success, wealth, and fame came after Zane, Dolly, and their three children (Romer, Betty, and Lore) moved to Altadena, California, in 1918. By 1930, he was hailed as the most sought-after writer in America. When he was not writing, Grey took lengthy trips to such places as New Zealand, Australia, and Tahiti, where he set world records with his deep-sea fishing catches (at one time he held ten world records) and where he had many of the experiences that later served as the basis for some of his writing. He enjoyed hunting and exploring as well, and these activities also found expression in his sports and adventure stories, written for both juvenile and adult readers. Zane Grey died October 23, 1939, in Altadena, California. During his lifetime he sold nearly 20 million copies of his novels, and another 20 million have been sold posthumously. Before his death he published 40 western romances in addition to works for juveniles, and collections of short stories and books on his adventures as a hunter, explorer, and fisherman. Since his death, another 23 of his books have been published.

Lina Elisa Roth was born in 1883 and came from a family of physicians. She was studying to be a school teacher when she met Zane Grey on a canoeing trip in 1900. On November 21, 1905, she Zane Grey were married. She and Zane had three children: Romer (1909-1976), Elizabeth (1912-2007), and Loren (1915-2007). Dolly was a great support to Zane in his early career and encouraged him to pursue a career in writing. She became his agent and managed his affairs, while also supporting him financially with her inheritance. She also acted as copy editor and proof-reader of Grey's literary works. She died in 1957.