Author Susan Stevens Crummel had some firsthand experience before writing Ten-Gallon Bart. As a high school teacher in Texas, one of her extra-curricular duties was sponsoring the rodeo club. Little did she know she'd have to ride a steer in the sponsor's rodeo. "As I clung to the beast's gigantic horns, I decided that the following year, I'd go back to coaching the math team!" she said. Susan also likes to tell stories about her great-great uncle Harvey Doyle, an expert rider and trick roper in Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show in the early 1900s. Besides collaborating with Dorothy Donohue on three other picture books, she has collaborated with her sister, Janet Stevens, on The Great Fuzz Frenzy, The Dish Ran Away with the Spoon, Cook-a-Doodle-Doo!, and Jackalope.

Illustrator Dorothy Donohue says that her dog Bart inspired Ten-Gallon Bart and Ten-Gallon Bart and the Wild West Show. Besides the books she's done with Susan Stevens Crummel, she has also illustrated If Frogs Made Weather by Marion Bane Bauer and Maybe Yes, Maybe No, Maybe Maybe by Susan Patron. She lives in Boulder, Colorado, with her husband James, their two children, and their two dogs.