American children's writers

Margaret_Hodges

Sarah Margaret Hodges née Moore (July 26, 1911 – December 13, 2005) was an American writer of children's books, librarian, and storyteller.
Sarah Margaret Moore was born in Indianapolis, Indiana to Arthur Carlisle Moore and Annie Marie Moore. She enrolled at Tudor Hall, a college preparatory school for girls. A 1932 graduate of Vassar College, she arrived in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with her husband Fletcher Hodges Jr. when in 1937 he became curator at the Stephen Foster Memorial. She trained as a librarian at Carnegie Institute of Technology, now Carnegie Mellon University, under Elizabeth Nesbitt, and she volunteered as a storyteller at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. Beginning in 1958 with One Little Drum, she wrote more than 40 published books. She also wrote the book John F. Kennedy Voice of Hope. In 1953, she was hired as the storyteller for a radio show called Let's Tell A Story. It became the storytelling segment, "Tell Me a Story", for Fred Rogers' children's television show at WQED, which ran from the mid-1960s to 1976 (the first run of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood).
Illustrator Trina Schart Hyman won the annual Caldecott Medal for the 1985 picture book Saint George and the Dragon written by Hodges. Two more of her well-known works are What's for Lunch, Charley?, and Merlin and the Making of the King.
She was a professor of library science at the University of Pittsburgh, where she retired in 1976.
Hodges died of heart disease December 13, 2005, at her home in Oakmont, Pennsylvania. She suffered from Parkinson's disease.She wrote her stories on a notepad or a typewriter. "I need good ideas, and they don't come out of machines", she once said.

Charlotte_Zolotow

Charlotte Zolotow (born Charlotte Gertrude Shapiro; June 26, 1915 – November 19, 2013) was an American writer, poet, editor, and publisher of many books for children. She wrote about 70 picture book texts.The writers she edited include Paul Fleischman, Paul Zindel, Mary Rodgers, Robert Lipsyte, and Francesca Lia Block.

Marie_Hammontree

Marie Gertrude Hammontree (June 19, 1913 - December 7, 2012) was an American children's author known for her biographies of famous people. Her works include Albert Einstein, Young Thinker and Walt Disney, Young Movie Maker.

Kay_Chorao

Kay Chorao, born as Ann McKay Sproat on January 7, 1936, (some sources say 1937) in Elkhart, Indiana, is an American artist, illustrator and writer of children's books.

Phyllis_Reynolds_Naylor

Phyllis Reynolds Naylor (born January 4, 1933) is an American writer best known for children's and young adult fiction. Naylor is best known for her children's-novel quartet Shiloh (a 1992 Newbery Medal winner) and for her "Alice" book series, one of the most frequently challenged books of the last decade.

Sue_Alexander

Sue Alexander (August 20, 1933 – July 3, 2008) was an American writer of children's literature. She authored 26 books for children as well as "scores of stories" for newspapers and magazines. She was also a children's book reviewer for the Los Angeles Times. She was a charter member and advisory board member of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, which established two awards in her name in recognition of her efforts to educate and mentor aspiring writers.

Virginia_Sorensen

Virginia Louise Sorensen (née Eggertsen; February 17, 1912 – December 24, 1991), also credited as Virginia Sorenson, was an American regionalist writer. Her role in Utah and Mormon literature places her within the "lost generation" of Mormon writers. She was awarded the 1957 Newbery Medal for her children's novel, Miracles on Maple Hill.