As I thought about what to feature for today's Tidbits last night, my son came up to me and said mommy I wanna read to you....he promptly sat down and read me Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Suess. You see this week at school they are celebrating Dr. Suess's birthday. It got me to thinking about all the books I read by Dr. Suess as I was growing up and the impact they made on me. So today's Tidbits is going to be about Dr. Suess and his legacy. Most of the information that I will be sharing is thanks to a wonderful site called Suessville.
Yes, there was a Dr. Suess, though he wasn't a real doctor. Theodore (Ted) Suess Geisel was born March 2, 1904 in Massachusetts. His father was a brewmaster and his mother worked in her father's bakery before marrying. She often memorized the pies of the day and would "chant" them to her customers. Often if Ted had difficulty going to sleep his mother would re-call her "pie selling chants" to help him go to sleep. As an adult, Ted credited his mother "for the rhythms in which I write an the urgency with which I do it" (Morgan, pg7)
Ted attended Dartmouth University, even was editor for Dartmouth's humor magazine, his reign came to abrupt end when he and his friends were caught throwing a party that didn't coincide with school policy. He still contributed to the magazine, but simply signed his work Suess, this is the first record of him going by this name. After Dartmouth, Ted attended Oxford University intending to become a professor, but a fellow student noticed his doodling and told him he should become an artist, so that is what he did and he eventually married the very same student who gave him that advice.
Dr. Suess died Sept. 24th, 1991 and at that time over 200 million copies of his books had sold and had been translated into 15 different languages. Sales continue to climb every year. Shortly before his death, when Ted was asked if there was anything left unsaid, he thought about it and finally came back with " The best slogan I can think of leave with the U.S.A. would be : We can....and we've got to...do better than this." (morgan, pg287)
Such an inspiration for our children is Dr. Suess, and who of us doesn't have some part of one of his books memorized as a favorite? Dr. Suess wrote 48 children's books in his lifetime...what an amazing feet! Tell me what is your favorite Dr. Suess book?
(all information provided in this post was found on the Suessville website found at www.suessville.com)
