Ladybugs & Stinkbugs

From Wikipedia

Life and career

Theodor Seuss Geisel was born on March 2, 1904 in Springfield, Massachusetts[1] to Henrietta Seuss and Theodor Robert Geisel.[2] He had two sisters, Marnie and Henrietta. Henrietta died of pneumonia at 18 months old. He attended Fremont Intermediate School from age 12 to age 14. His father was a parks superintendent in charge of Forest Park (Springfield), a large park that included a zoo and was located three blocks from a library. Both Geisel's father and grandfather were brewmasters in Springfield, which may have influenced his views on Prohibition. As a freshman member of the Dartmouth College class of 1925, he became a member of Sigma Phi Epsilon. He also joined the Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern, eventually rising to the rank of editor-in-chief. (He took over the post from his close friend, author Norman MacLean.) However, after Geisel was caught throwing a drinking party (and thereby violating Prohibition laws), the school insisted that he resign from all extracurricular activities. In order to continue his work on the Jack-O-Lantern without the administration's knowledge, Geisel began signing his work with the pen name "Seuss" (which was both his middle name and his mother's maiden name). His first work signed as "Dr. Seuss" appeared after he graduated, six months into his work for humor magazine The Judge where his weekly feature Birdsies and Beasties appeared.[3] Seuss's family, having emigrated from Germany, would have pronounced their name as "zoice", the standard pronunciation in German (according to census, Geisel's mother was born in Massachusetts, and it was her parents who were the immigrants). Alexander Liang, who served with Geisel on the staff of the Jack-O- Lantern and was later a professor at Dartmouth, illustrated this point.

Though Geisel himself has been quoted as saying "Seuss -- rhymes with voice", the name is almost universally pronounced in English with an initial s sound and rhyming with "juice".[4] Geisel also used the pen name Theo. LeSieg (Geisel spelled backwards) for books he wrote but others illustrated.

He entered Lincoln College, Oxford, intending to earn a D.Phil in literature. At Oxford he met his future wife Helen Palmer; he married her in 1927, and returned to the United States without earning the degree. The "Dr." in his pen name is an acknowledgment of his father's unfulfilled hopes that Seuss would earn a doctorate at Oxford.

He began submitting humorous articles and illustrations to Judge, The Saturday Evening Post, Life, Vanity Fair, and Liberty. One notable "Technocracy Number" made fun of the Technocracy movement and featured satirical rhymes at the expense of Frederick Soddy. He became nationally famous from his advertisements for Flit, a common insecticide at the time. His slogan, "Quick, Henry, the Flit!" became a popular catchphrase. Geisel supported himself and his wife through the Great Depression by drawing advertising for General Electric, NBC, Standard Oil, and many other companies. He also wrote and drew a short-lived comic strip called Hejji in 1935.[3]

In 1937, while Seuss was returning from an ocean voyage to Europe, the rhythm of the ship's engines inspired the poem that became his first book, And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street. Seuss wrote three more children's books before World War II (see list of works below), two of which are, atypically for him, in prose.

As World War II began, Dr. Seuss turned to political cartoons, drawing over 400 in two years as editorial cartoonist for the left-wing New York City daily newspaper, PM. Dr. Seuss' political cartoons, later published in Dr. Seuss Goes to War, opposed the viciousness of Hitler and Mussolini and were highly critical of isolationists, most notably Charles Lindbergh, who opposed American entry into the war. One cartoon[5] depicted all Japanese Americans as latent traitors or fifth-columnists, while at the same time other cartoons deplored the racism at home against Jews and blacks that harmed the war effort. His cartoons were strongly supportive of President Roosevelt's conduct of the war, combining the usual exhortations to ration and contribute to the war effort with frequent attacks on Congress (especially the Republican Party), parts of the press (such as the New York Daily News and Chicago Tribune), and others for criticism of Roosevelt, criticism of aid to the Soviet Union, investigation of suspected Communists, and other offenses that he depicted as leading to disunity and helping the Nazis, intentionally or inadvertently. In 1942, Dr. Seuss turned his energies to direct support of the U.S. war effort. First, he worked drawing posters for the Treasury Department and the War Production Board. Then, in 1943, he joined the Army and was commander of the Animation Dept of the First Motion Picture Unit of the United States Army Air Forces, where he wrote films that included Your Job in Germany, a 1945 propaganda film about peace in Europe after World War II, Design for Death, a study of Japanese culture that won the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 1947, and the Private Snafu series of adult army training films. While in the Army, he was awarded the Legion of Merit. Dr. Seuss' non-military films from around this time were also well-received; Gerald McBoing-Boing won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject (Animated) in 1950.

Despite his numerous awards, Dr. Seuss never won the Caldecott Medal nor the Newbery. Three of his titles were chosen as Caldecott runners-up (now referred to as Caldecott Honor books): McElligot's Pool (1947), Bartholomew and the Oobleck (1949), and If I Ran the Zoo (1950).

After the war, Dr. Seuss and his wife moved to La Jolla, California. Returning to children's books, he wrote what many consider to be his finest works, including such favorites as If I Ran the Zoo, (1950), Scrambled Eggs Super! (1953), On Beyond Zebra! (1955), If I Ran the Circus (1956), and How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1957).

At the same time, an important development occurred that influenced much of Seuss' later work. In May 1954, Life magazine published a report on illiteracy among school children, which concluded that children were not learning to read because their books were boring. Accordingly, Seuss' publisher made up a list of 400 words he felt were important and asked Dr. Seuss to cut the list to 250 words and write a book using only those words. Nine months later, Seuss, using 220 of the words given to him, completed The Cat in the Hat. This book was a tour de force—it retained the drawing style, verse rhythms, and all the imaginative power of Seuss' earlier works, but because of its simplified vocabulary could be read by beginning readers. A rumor exists, that in 1960, Bennett Cerf bet Dr. Seuss $50 that he couldn't write an entire book using only fifty words. The result was supposedly Green Eggs and Ham. The additional rumor that Cerf never paid Seuss the $50 has never been proven and is most likely untrue. These books achieved significant international success and remain very popular.

Dr. Seuss went on to write many other children's books, both in his new simplified-vocabulary manner (sold as "Beginner Books") and in his older, more elaborate style. In 1982 Dr. Seuss wrote "Hunches in Bunches". The Beginner Books were not easy for Seuss, and reportedly he labored for months crafting them.

At various times Seuss also wrote books for adults that used the same style of verse and pictures: The Seven Lady Godivas; Oh, The Places You'll Go!; and You're Only Old Once.

On October 23, 1967, during a very difficult illness, Dr. Seuss' wife, Helen Palmer Geisel, committed suicide. Seuss married Audrey Stone Dimond on June 21, 1968. Seuss himself died, following several years of illness, in La Jolla, California on September 24, 1991.

On December 1, 1995 UCSD's University Library Building was renamed Geisel Library in honor of Audrey and Seuss for the generous contributions they have made to the library and their devotion to improving literacy.[6]

Dr. Seuss was frequently confused, by the US Postal Service among others, with Dr. Suess (Hans Suess), his contemporary living in the same locality, La Jolla. Their names have been linked together posthumously: the personal papers of Hans Suess are housed in the Geisel Library at UC San Diego.[6]

In 2002, the Dr. Seuss National Memorial Sculpture Garden opened in his birthplace of Springfield, Massachusetts; it features sculptures of Dr. Seuss and of many of his characters.

Though he devoted most of his life to writing children's books, he never had any children himself.