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Emery Oliver Blagdon (1907-1986) was born in Callaway, Nebraska, Blagdon was the oldest of six children. His parents, Edward and Emma Mtizner Blagdon, lived on a parcel of land homesteaded by Emma’s father, atop a plateau in Nebraska’s Sandhills.{{cite book|author1=Leslie Umberger|author2=Erika Doss|author3=John Michael Kohler Arts Center|title=Sublime Spaces and Visionary Worlds: Built Environments of Vernacular Artists|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3CdgUwZBNwIC&pg=PA204|date=4 October 2007|publisher=Princeton Architectural Press|isbn=978-1-56898-728-6|pages=204–}}

As a younger man, Blagdon spend several decades traveling the American west by boxcar, doing seasonal labor and odd jobs, as well as searching for gold in California. In 1934 or 35, he learned that his mother was terminally ill with stomach cancer. He returned to the family home, and stayed in the area hereafter. Emma died in 1936, leaving her son disturbed by the pain and suffering she went through; Emery’s widowed father responded to the loss by withdrawing from farming and social interaction.

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