Clara Whitehill Hunt | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | June 25, 1871 |
| Died | January 10, 1958 (aged 86) |
| Occupation | Librarian |
Clara Whitehill Hunt (June 25, 1871 - January 10, 1958) was an American teacher, librarian, writer, and advocate for children's library services. [1]
Clara Whitehill Hunt | |
|---|---|
| | |
| Born | June 25, 1871 |
| Died | January 10, 1958 (aged 86) |
| Occupation | Librarian |
Clara Whitehill Hunt (June 25, 1871 - January 10, 1958) was an American teacher, librarian, writer, and advocate for children's library services. [1]
Clara Whitehill Hunt was born in Utica, New York, in 1871. [1] Born to Edwin and Mary M. (Brown) Hunt, who were originally from Sudbury, Massachusetts, Clara grew up on the farm. She attended the Utica Free Academy in Utica, New York for grade school, which has since been turned into a nursing home. [2] [3] Her father was known to have taught natural science at the same school during her attendance. She graduated high school in 1889 and began a career as a teacher shortly thereafter. [1]
After graduating high school in 1889 and becoming a teacher, Clara was promoted to principal of Utica Public School, where she had begun her career. Visiting the library often during her career as a teacher, Clara found the library to play an important role in the lives of children and teachers. Upon meeting with a trained librarian, Miss Louise Cutler, she was determined to become a trained librarian. Clara went on to attend the New York State Library School at Albany in 1986.
After spending two years in library school, Clara landed a job in Philadelphia and opened the New Children's Room of the Old Apprentices Library. From there she became an assistant in the reference department in Newark Public Library system, where she became acquainted with various library duties. During her time working in the library, Clara excelled at the task of working with children, which became her main focus as the years went on. In 1901, she was put in charge of the Newark Public Library's children's room, where she had first been hired as an assistant within the reference department. A few years later, she went to work at the Brooklyn Public Library as Superintendent of Work with Children. [1] She spent 37 years within this position, from the year of 1903 to 1940. [4] [5]
Over the years, as more branches surfaced, Clara helped to design and equip the children's rooms within the new established libraries. She was known to have designed the staff rooms as well, which she took pride in doing. [6] One of her most famous designs, Clara provided the vision behind the children's room of the Central Library. [6] Within the Brooklyn Public Library system, Clara help to open the first children's library in 1914, now noted as the Stone Avenue Branch. This library in particular housed smaller furniture, larger windows, decorations, a fireplace, and classrooms. [7]
Along with the other tasks noted above, Clara also trained children's librarians and staffed them within these libraries. [1] Beginning in 1914, these informal trainings soon turned into formal training courses for children's librarians, which was incorporated into many schools' curricula thereafter. [8]
In addition to training new recruits, designing children's rooms, and working as a superintendent, Clara lectured for various library schools, edited for magazines, and authored books as well. There are five children's books that Clara is most well known for: [2]
Clara noted that she was inspired to write, What Shall We Read to the Children, after the mothers of the kindergartners that she worked with asked her this same question many times. She noted that '"About Harriet, "was inspired by a young friend of hers who grew up in the city, a very different life from her own. [2] She had very strong opinions on the level at which a children's book should be written. Described as fair and idealistic, Clara was known to have not allowed comic books within her collections. [6] During her career, she canvassed American publishers to produce high quality picture books that were up to the same standards of those that were being produced in Europe. The Houghton Mifflin Company began to publish high quality picture books by author E. Boyd Smith after being persuaded by Clara. [9]
For the Brooklyn Daily Eagle (1922), she stated (as noted on the Brooklyn Public Library website),
Among many accomplishments, Clara presented the very first of the American Library Association Newbery Awards in 1922. [4] She also was chairmen for the very first Newbery Committee, 1921-1922. [5] She presented this award to Hendrik Willem van Loon for his work, The Story of Mankind. [10] This yearly award began as a plan to honor the most distinguished children's author of the previous calendar year with a bronze medal for their achievement. Originally named the John Newbery Medal, it was named after an old London book seller who has been credited as one of the first to give special attention to children's collections. [11]
Having devoted most of her career to children's library services, Clara retired from her duties as a librarian in 1939. At this point, she moved to Sudbury, Massachusetts, which would be her final resting place. She died on January 11, 1958, in her parents' home town. [8]
A legacy of her career is at the Brooklyn Public Library: the Clara Whitehill Hunt Collection of Children's Literature. This collection encompasses 13,000 books, pamphlets, and periodicals, which date all the way back from 1741 up unto the 1950s. Within this collection is the Old Juvenile collection, which features 4,500 pieces dating from 1741 into the early 1900s. The Hunt Collection is available for viewing by appointment only. [5]
The John Newbery Medal, frequently shortened to the Newbery, is a literary award given by the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), to the author of "the most distinguished contributions to American literature for children". The Newbery and the Caldecott Medal are considered the two most prestigious awards for children's literature in the United States. Books selected are widely carried by bookstores and libraries, the authors are interviewed on television, and master's theses and doctoral dissertations are written on them. Named for John Newbery, an 18th-century English publisher of juvenile books, the winner of the Newbery is selected at the ALA's Midwinter Conference by a fifteen-person committee. The Newbery was proposed by Frederic G. Melcher in 1921, making it the first children's book award in the world. The physical bronze medal was designed by Rene Paul Chambellan and is given to the winning author at the next ALA annual conference. Since its founding there have been several changes to the composition of the selection committee, while the physical medal remains the same.
Ruth Sawyer was an American storyteller and a writer of fiction and non-fiction for children and adults. She may be best known as the author of Roller Skates, which won the 1937 Newbery Medal. She received the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award in 1965 for her lifetime achievement in children's literature.
Elaine Lobl Konigsburg was an American writer and illustrator of children's books and young adult fiction. She is one of six writers to win two Newbery Medals, the venerable American Library Association award for the year's "most distinguished contribution to American children's literature."
Cynthia Rylant is an American author and librarian. She has written more than 100 children's books, including works of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. Several of her books have won awards, including her novel Missing May, which won the 1993 Newbery Medal, and A Fine White Dust, which was a 1987 Newbery Honor book. Two of her books are Caldecott Honor Books.
Irene Hunt was an American children's writer known best for historical novels. She was a runner-up for the Newbery Medal for her first book, Across Five Aprils, and won the medal for her second, Up a Road Slowly. For her contribution as a children's writer she was U.S. nominee in 1974 for the biennial, international Hans Christian Andersen Award, the highest international recognition available to creators of children's books.
Eleanor Estes was an American children's writer and a children's librarian. Her book Ginger Pye, for which she also created illustrations, won the Newbery Medal. Three of her books were Newbery Honor Winners, and one was awarded the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award. Estes' books were based on her life in small-town Connecticut in the early 1900s.
Cornelia Lynde Meigs (1884–1973) was an American writer of fiction and biography for children, teacher of English and writing, historian and critic of children's literature. She won the Newbery Medal for her 1933 biography of Louisa May Alcott, entitled Invincible Louisa. She also wrote three Newbery Honor Books.
Carolyn Sherwin Bailey was an American children's author. She was born in Hoosick Falls, New York and attended Teachers College, Columbia University, from which she graduated in 1896. She contributed to the Ladies' Home Journal and other magazines. She published volumes of stories for children like methods of story telling, teaching children and other related subjects, which include Boys and Girls of Colonial Days (1917); Broad Stripes and Bright Stars (1919); Hero Stories (1919); Tops and Whistles (1937), and The Little Rabbit Who Wanted Red Wings (1945). She wrote For the Children's Hour (1906) in collaboration with Clara M. Lewis. In 1947, her book Miss Hickory won the Newbery Medal.
Anne Carroll Moore was an American educator, writer and advocate for children's libraries.
Jacqueline Woodson is an American writer of books for children and adolescents. She is best known for Miracle's Boys, and her Newbery Honor-winning titles Brown Girl Dreaming, After Tupac and D Foster, Feathers, and Show Way. After serving as the Young People's Poet Laureate from 2015 to 2017, she was named the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, by the Library of Congress, for 2018 to 2019. Her novel Another Brooklyn was shortlisted for the 2016 National Book Award for Fiction. She won the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award in 2018. She was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2020.
Laura Amy Schlitz is an American author of children's literature. She is a librarian and storyteller at the Park School of Baltimore in Brooklandville, Maryland.
May Massee was an American children's book editor. She was the founding head of the juvenile departments at Doubleday from 1922 and at Viking Press from 1932. Before working at Doubleday, she edited the American Library Association periodical Booklist.
Mabel Leigh Hunt was an American writer of children's books.
Margaret Clara Scoggin was one of the first librarians to expand dramatically upon the idea of young adult public librarianship. Scoggin implemented several programs throughout her career at the New York Public Library that placed intense importance on young adult readers, which ultimately inspired the ever-improving teen librarianship seen today. She said of young adults, "They are a vital force which the library can both develop and use. They are the voters of tomorrow, the potential adult users and supporters of the public library, the emergent community to whom, theoretically, the public library belongs." In 1999, American Libraries named her one of the "100 Most Important Leaders We Had in the 20th Century".
Caroline Maria Hewins was an American librarian.
Clara Stanton Jones was the first African-American president of the American Library Association, serving as its acting president from April 11 to July 22 in 1976 and then its president from July 22, 1976, to 1977. Also, in 1970 she became the first African American and the first woman to serve as director of a major library system in America, as director of the Detroit Public Library.
Genevieve Stump Foster was an American children's writer who illustrated most of her own books. She was one runner-up for the annual Newbery Medal four times, one of four writers to do so.
Mary Buff and Conrad Buff II were married creators of illustrated children's books. Between 1937 and 1968, they collaborated on both text and illustrations to produce 14 books; four times they were a runner-up for the Caldecott Medal or Newbery Medal. They had a profound impact on children's literature in the middle of the 20th century.
Mary Gould Davis was an American author, librarian, storyteller and editor. She received a Newbery Honor.
Lillian Helena Smith was the first British Empire children's librarian. Over the course of her career, Smith established library spaces and services for children within the Toronto Public Library, Toronto schools, and at the Hospital for Sick Children. She also helped to create a library classification system that was used for children’s collections at Toronto libraries until the late 1990s. The Lillian H. Smith Toronto Public Library branch, opened in 1995, is named after her.
Media related to Clara Whitehill Hunt at Wikimedia Commons
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