Eakins attended fights in 1898, and aided by sportswriters Clarence Cranmer and Henry Walter Schlichter, met with and hired fighters to pose for him.

[7][8] Salutat, Between Rounds (a portion of which was executed separately as Billy Smith) and Taking the Count are a series of three large boxing paintings done by Eakins.

On the painting's original frame Eakins carved the words "DEXTRA VICTRICE CONCLAMANTES SALVTAT" (With the victorious right hand, he salutes those shouting [their approval]).

[11] As with a number of other Eakins works, the rendering of the figures is extremely precise, such that it has allowed art historians to identify individual members of the audience.

[16] Eakins sent the painting to the Annual of the Pennsylvania Academy in January 1899,[17] and although it "failed to please the few critics who noticed it", he exhibited the picture a total of four times in the next five years.

[18] The painting remained unsold during Eakins's lifetime, and was bought from his widow by Thomas Cochran in 1929; he subsequently donated the picture to the Addison Gallery of American Art at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts.