Born 1904
Theodor Seuss Geisel was born on March 2, 1904 in Springfield, Massachusetts, to Theodor Robert and Henrietta (Seuss) Geisel. All of his grandparents were German immigrants. His father managed the family brewery closed due to Prohibition. Mulberry Street in Springfield, made famous in Dr. Seuss' first children's book And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street! is less than a mile southwest of his boyhood home on Fairfield street.
If you want to pronounce the name the way his family did, say Zoice,not Soose. Seuss is a Bavarian name, and was his mother’s maiden name: Henrietta Seuss’s parents emigrated from Bavaria (part of modern-day Germany) in the nineteenth century. Seuss was also his middle name
In 1955, Dartmouth gave him his first honorary doctorate. He would eventually receive several more honorary degrees, including one from Princeton. By pursuing his love of drawing, Ted Geisel became one of the few people to earn a Ph.D. by dropping out of graduate school.
He creates his first “Quick, Henry, the Flit!” advertisement. He became
nationally famous from his
advertisements for Flit, a
common insecticide at the
time. “Quick, Henry, the Flit!”
became a popular catchphrase.
To silence friends who bragged about their own children, Ted liked to boast of the achievements of their imaginary daughter, Chrysanthemum-Pearl. He even dedicated The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins (1938) — his second children’s book — to “Chrysanthemum-Pearl (aged 89 months, going on 90).” He included her on Christmas cards, along with Norval, Wally, Wickersham, Miggles, Boo-Boo, Thnud, and other purely fictional children. For a photograph used on one year’s Christmas card, Geisel even invited in half a dozen neighborhood kids to pose as his and Helen’s children. The card reads, “All of us over at Our House / Wish all of you over at / Your House / A very Merry Christmas,” and is signed “Helen and Ted Geisel and the kiddies.”
Legacy
At the time of Ted’s death on September 24, 1991, some 200 million copies of his books, translated into 15 different languages, had found their way into homes and hearts around the world. Since then, sales continue to climb, estimated at more than 300 million since 1991
Honors and Tributes
Awards include an Oscar for Gerald McBoing-Boing (Best Cartoon, 1951); two Emmys for Halloween is Grinch Night and The Grinch Grinches the Cat in the Hat (Best Children’s Special, 1977 and1982, respectively); a Pulitzer Prize (1984); a Peabody for the animated specials How the Grinch Stole Christmas! and Horton Hears a Who! (1971); and a New York Library Literary Lion (1986). Three of his books received Caldecott Honor Awards: McElligot’s Pool (1947), Bartholomew and the Oobleck (1949), and If I Ran the Zoo (1950). In 1980, the American Library Association (the same organization responsible for the prestigious Newbery and Caldecott Awards) honored Ted with a Laura Ingalls Wilder Award.
ARTWORK
Geisel's earlier artwork often employed the shaded texture of pencil drawings or watercolors, but in children's books of the postwar period he generally employed the starker medium of pen and ink, normally using just black, white, and one or two colors. Later books such as The Lorax used more colors.
NEA's Read Across America
An annual reading motivation and awareness program that calls for every child in every community to celebrate reading on March 2, the birthday of beloved children's author Dr. Seuss.
Some books by Dr. Seuss
- And to Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street (1938)
- The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins (1938)
- The King's Stilts (1939)
- The Seven Lady Godivas (1939)
- Horton Hatches the Egg (1940)
- McElligot's Pool (1947)
- Thidwick, The Big-Hearted Moose (1948)
- If I Ran the Zoo (1950)
- Horton Hears a Who (1954)
- Scrambled Eggs Super! (1954)
- On Beyond Zebra (1955)
- If I Ran the Circus (1956)
- The Cat in the Hat (1957)
- Daisy-Head Mayzie (1994) Published after Dr. Seuss death in 1991.
Theodor Seuss Geisel was a famous American writer and cartoonist best know for his classic children’s books under the pen name Dr. Seuss, including The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham and How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
Seuss
1925 -1931
Geisel attended Dartmouth College as a member of the Class of 1925. At Dartmouth, he joined the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity and the humor magazine Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern, eventually rising to the rank of editor-in-chief. After Dartmouth, he entered Lincoln College, Oxford, intending to earn a Doctor of Philosophy in English literature. At Oxford, he met his future wife, Helen Palmer; he married her in 1927, and returned to the United States.
1931
Helen learns she cannot have children and Ted writes his first children’s book, an ABC of fanciful creatures. It does not find a publisher.
1967 Helen Palmer Geisel
dies on October 23
On June 21, 1968 Geisel married
Audrey Stone Diamond
Geisel died at his home of throat cancer on September 24, 1991 at his home in La Jolla at the age of 87
World War II-era work
1941 Seuss begins his career as a political cartoonist, ultimately publishing over 400 cartoons in the New York newspaper PM
1943
Joining the army’s information and Education Division, Captian Geisel goes to Hollywood’s “Fort Fox,” where, working with civilian directors Chuck Jones and Friz Frelend, he creates Private SNAFU, who teaches by negative example.
1947
Seuss wins a Best Documentary Feature Academy Award for Design for Death, a history of the Japanese people co-written with his wife, Helen.
learn more at
http://www.seussville.com/