March 28: Today in the History of Children’s Books

🎂 Born March 28, 1924: Byrd Baylor

Amer­i­can writer and poetBaird Bay­lorBorn (1924–2021). Her writ­ing is as vast, pro­found, and rhyth­mic as the Ari­zona desert.

  • Impor­tant works and achieve­ments:
    • Calde­cott Hon­or: With theEagle, I am your broth­er.-Hawk, I’m Your Broth­er(Pub­lished in 1976) won awards 1977 Calde­cott Hon­or.
    • Artis­tic fea­tures: Her sto­ries are typ­i­cal­ly root­ed in the land and Native Amer­i­can cul­ture of the Amer­i­can South­west. She has a long-stand­ing col­lab­o­ra­tion with illus­tra­tor Peter Par­nall, and her writ­ing is philo­soph­i­cal, often explor­ing how human­i­ty can coex­ist har­mo­nious­ly with the land, rocks, and wild crea­tures. Her work is less about sto­ry­telling and more about recit­ing hymns to nature.

| Birth | Baird Bay­lor | Byrd Bay­lor (Wikipedia) |


🎂 Born March 28, 1966: Doreen Cronin

A high­ly suc­cess­ful con­tem­po­rary Amer­i­can humor­ous chil­dren’s book authorDoreen CroninBorn. She excels at giv­ing farm ani­mals extreme­ly human-like, quirky per­son­al­i­ties.

  • Rep­re­sen­ta­tive works and influ­ence:
    • Click, click, mooClick, Clack, Moo: Cows That TypeThis is her most famous work, which tells the absurd and humor­ous sto­ry of a group of typ­ing cows going on strike to demand elec­tric blan­kets from the farmer (win­ner of the 2001 Calde­cott Hon­or).
    • ““Diary” series: Espe­cial­ly the illus­tra­tions by Har­ry BriceEarth­worm Diary-Diary of a Worm(The book), which switch­es between first-per­son and hilar­i­ous per­spec­tives, has become a glob­al phe­nom­e­non in pop­u­lar sci­ence and humor pic­ture books.
    • style: She infus­es her pic­ture books with a crisp and straight­for­ward sense of humor, and her char­ac­ters, such as “the duck who wants to be pres­i­dent” and “the typ­ist cow,” have become clas­sic fig­ures in mod­ern chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture who are anti-tra­di­tion­al and full of inde­pen­dent thought.

| Birth | Doreen Cronin | Doreen Cronin (Wikipedia) |


⚰️ March 28, 2016 — Passed away Peggy Fortnum

British illus­tra­torPeg­gy Fort­namHe died in 1919–2016.

  • Mile­stone achieve­ment:
    • The first cre­ator of Padding­ton Bear: In 1958, when Michael Bond’s first film…A bear named Padding­ton-A Bear Called Padding­tonWhen it was pub­lished, Fort­nam was respon­si­ble for the illus­tra­tions in the book.
    • Artis­tic Sta­tus: Despite numer­ous adap­ta­tions of Padding­ton Bear since (includ­ing films and col­or pic­ture books), Fort­nam’s sim­ple, live­ly, and sketch-like black and white lines defined the orig­i­nal image of this lit­tle bear from the “dark side of Peru”: those slight­ly con­fused yet firm and gen­tle eyes. Her con­tri­bu­tion was includ­ed in “1001 Chil­dren’s Books”.

| Passed Away | Peg­gy Fort­nam | Peg­gy Fort­num (Wikipedia) |


🎂 Born March 28, 1945: Tilman Röhrig

famous Ger­man actor and writerTill­man Lerichborn.

  • Impor­tant works and achieve­ments:
    • Ger­man Youth Lit­er­a­ture Prize (DJLP): With thePer­haps three hun­dred years lat­er-In drei­hun­dert Jahren vielle­icht) won 1984 Ger­man Youth Lit­er­a­ture Prize.
    • con­tent: This is an extreme­ly somber yet pro­found­ly reflec­tive his­tor­i­cal nov­el, set against the back­drop of the bru­tal Thir­ty Years’ War, depict­ing the strug­gles and hopes of ordi­nary peo­ple in a tur­bu­lent era. With its rig­or­ous his­tor­i­cal research and com­pelling nar­ra­tive, it stands as a lead­ing work of Ger­man his­tor­i­cal chil­dren’s lit­er­a­ture.

| Birth | Till­man Lerich | Tilman Röhrig (Wiki­da­ta) |