Lois Lenski
Encyclopedia
Lois Lenski was a popular and prolific American
writer of children's and young adult fiction.
One of her projects was a collection of regional novels about children across the United States. Titles in this series include her most famous work, Strawberry Girl
, about a girl in Florida; Blue Ridge Billy, about a North Carolina youth living in rural Appalachia; Bayou Suzette, etc.
In 1946 she was awarded the Newbery Medal
for Strawberry Girl.
For over fifty years Lois Lenski pursued her professional career as an illustrator and author of books for children. During that time she illustrated some fifty books for other authors, and wrote and illustrated nearly 100 of her own books. Lenski's writing included picture books and stories for very young children as well as intermediate works for older children and young adults. Although she wrote primarily prose, Lenski also published books of poetry, songs and plays for children. Lois Lenski's life is a unique balance of family and career. Her close family and small town upbringing provided a personal foundation and served as a strong influence in her writing and career.
Lois Lenski Elementary School in Centennial, Colorado is named after the famed author. The Lois Lenski Superstars are proud of their heritage.
. Her father, R. C. H. Lenski, a Prussian immigrant, was a Lutheran clergyman and later an academic and author of a standard series of Lutheran commentaries. Her mother, a native of Franklin County, Ohio, was a schoolteacher before her marriage.
The Lenskis had five children, three girls and two boys, of which Lois was their fourth child.
In 1899, Pastor Richard Lenski was called to serve a parish in Anna, Ohio
, and the family moved to the small rural community west of Springfield.
The next twelve years of Lois Lenski's life were spent in Anna, and many of her fondest childhood memories were of life in this small town.
Lenski's autobiography, Journey Into Childhood, provides a detailed description of her years in Anna. Although a strict father and a busy pastor, Richard Lenski always made time for his children and involved them in his hobbies of drawing and photography. Marietta Lenski was a devoted mother and homemaker who encouraged her children to work hard and pursue a college education. Lois Lenski's home life instilled in her the importance of learning. In addition to being an avid reader, she was also skilled at sewing and drawing, often copying pictures from books and magazines.
Since Anna, Ohio was too small a community to offer secondary education, Lois Lenski made a daily train trip to Sidney, Ohio
to attend high school.
She graduated in 1911 and the family moved to Columbus
, where her father joined the faculty at Capital University
.
Since her father's institution was not co-educational, Lenski enrolled at Ohio State University
.
Following in her mother's footsteps, she prepared for a career in teaching.
In addition to education courses, she took as many art courses as possible, primarily drawing and lettering.
In 1915, Lois Lenski graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in education and a teaching certificate.
Although Richard and Marietta Lenski assumed their daughter would settle into a teaching job, Lois chose to deviate from her parent's wishes. At the urging of her art professors from Ohio State, she moved to New York City
to study at the Art Students League of New York
.
For the next four years, Lenski took art courses and worked part time to support herself. Although existing on a shoestring budget, Lenski loved the cultural advantages of New York. She took advantage of the opportunities to develop her talent through her classes and part time jobs such as lettering and painting greeting cards or drawing for fashion advertisements. In her class on illustration Lenski first met Arthur Covey
. She soon became his assistant in painting a number of murals. In October 1920, Lenski traveled to London
and Italy
to study and work. It was during her months in London that Lenski was first hired to illustrate books for the publisher John Lane
.
In 1921, shortly after returning from her travels, Lenski married Arthur Covey. She became thereby a stepmother to his two children, Margaret, age 12 and Laird, age 4. With her additional household and family responsibilities, Lenski had to carve out time for her own work. This often proved a difficult task and Lenski received no help with household chores from her new husband.
Lenski described the 1920s as her years of apprenticeship. Through continued practice and additional art classes, Lenski developed her talent in human figures and landscape drawing. She spent much of her early career as an illustrator of children's books. When a publisher suggested that she write her own story to accompany her drawings, Lenski embarked on a new track in her career. Although she had never considered writing, Lenski was determined to try her hand at being an author and illustrator. In 1927 Lenski published her first book, Skipping Village. The following year she wrote her second book, A Little Girl of 1900, based on her childhood experiences.
In February 1929, Lois Lenski gave birth to her son, Stephen. Within a few months the newly expanded Covey family moved to a farm in Connecticut that would be their home for over 30 years. Spurred by Stephen's toddler years, Lenski began her "Mr. Small" series with The Little Family (1932) and The Little Auto (1934). In the early stages of her writing in the 1930s Lenski wrote "a group of imaginative stories for pure amusement." These included Grandmother Tippytoe, Arabella and Her Aunts and Benny and His Penny. Lenski next moved into historical fiction, beginning with Phebe Fairchild, Her Book (1936), a story based on the Lenski farmhouse in Connecticut, built in 1790. Over the next decade Lenski wrote six more historical books including Bound Girl of Cobble Hill (1938), Blueberry Corners (1940) and Indian Captive (1941). Phebe Fairchild and Indian Captive both were named Newbery Honor books. As a change of pace from her intensely researched historical books, Lenski also published picture books including Sugarplum House (1934) and Gooseberry Garden (1935). She continued to illustrate the works of other writers, most notably Maud Hart Lovelace
's first four Betsy Tacy books. She worked very closely with Lovelace and her publishers to make the books true to their real-life context.
During the 1940s two other major factors, her travels and her grandson, influenced Lois Lenski's writing. Due to poor health, Lenski was ordered by her physician to get away from the fierce Connecticut winters. She and Arthur Covey chose to spend winters in the South, first in Louisiana
and then in Florida
. It was during her travels that Lenski began research and writing on her series of regional books. Beginning with Bayou Suzette (1943), based on life in the Louisiana backcountry, Lenski wrote some 16 regional books over the next twenty years. Perhaps her most successful regional story was Strawberry Girl (1945), winner of the Newbery Medal in 1946.
Inspired by her grandson, David Chisholm, Margaret's son, Lenski began the "Davy" series of books in the mid-1940s. David lived with his grandparents during the summers of 1943-1945 and was initially a very difficult child. Lenski's grandmotherly kindness finally won him over and his childhood activities became the basis for a series of six picture books including Davy's Day (1943) and A Surprise for Davy (1947).
In the 1950s and early 1960s, Lenski published the Roundabout series, also based on various areas of the U. S., but written for somewhat younger children. Much like the regional series, the Roundabout books explore the geographically and culturally diverse lives of children from peanut farms (Peanuts for Billy Ben, 1952), to cranberry bogs (Berries in the Scoop, 1956) and from housing projects (Project Boy, 1954) to Indian reservations (Little Sioux Girl, 1968).
Although Lenski suffered from illness again in the early 1950s, she gradually recovered and resumed her writing. Lenski and her husband began to spend half the year in Florida and built a house there in 1951. Arthur Covey, a man blessed with near perfect health all his life, became seriously ill in 1958. Although he resumed sketching and painting in their Florida home, he succumbed to his illness in February 1960. In 1964, Lenski sold the Greenacres farm in Connecticut and made her home in Florida year round. She continued writing in her later years, publishing her autobiography in 1972. In September 1974 at 80 years of age, Lois Lenski died at her home in Florida.
Lenski's many books have become classics in children's literature. Her books depicted children's lives much more realistically than other children's authors. She enthusiastically tackled areas and subjects long neglected in writing for children. The popularity of her works and their distribution in other languages are testimony both to her skill as a writer and to her continuing appeal to children.
Her impact on children continues through the Lois Lenski Covey Foundation, a charitable institute whose purpose is to assist organizations in their efforts to provide books to children who might otherwise lack access to children's literature.
Lenski has an elementary school named after her in Centennial Colorado.
Her papers are held at University of California, Berkeley
, and University of North Carolina, Greensboro.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
writer of children's and young adult fiction.
One of her projects was a collection of regional novels about children across the United States. Titles in this series include her most famous work, Strawberry Girl
Strawberry Girl
Strawberry Girl is a Newbery medal winning novel written and illustrated by Lois Lenski. It was first published in 1945.Set in the U.S. state of Florida in the early 20th century, the story deals with two families, the Boyers and the Slaters. The Boyers move to Florida to raise strawberries...
, about a girl in Florida; Blue Ridge Billy, about a North Carolina youth living in rural Appalachia; Bayou Suzette, etc.
In 1946 she was awarded the Newbery Medal
Newbery Medal
The John Newbery Medal is a literary award given by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association . The award is given to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children. The award has been given since 1922. ...
for Strawberry Girl.
For over fifty years Lois Lenski pursued her professional career as an illustrator and author of books for children. During that time she illustrated some fifty books for other authors, and wrote and illustrated nearly 100 of her own books. Lenski's writing included picture books and stories for very young children as well as intermediate works for older children and young adults. Although she wrote primarily prose, Lenski also published books of poetry, songs and plays for children. Lois Lenski's life is a unique balance of family and career. Her close family and small town upbringing provided a personal foundation and served as a strong influence in her writing and career.
Lois Lenski Elementary School in Centennial, Colorado is named after the famed author. The Lois Lenski Superstars are proud of their heritage.
Biography
She grew up in Springfield, OhioSpringfield, Ohio
Springfield is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Clark County. The municipality is located in southwestern Ohio and is situated on the Mad River, Buck Creek and Beaver Creek, approximately west of Columbus and northeast of Dayton. Springfield is home to Wittenberg...
. Her father, R. C. H. Lenski, a Prussian immigrant, was a Lutheran clergyman and later an academic and author of a standard series of Lutheran commentaries. Her mother, a native of Franklin County, Ohio, was a schoolteacher before her marriage.
The Lenskis had five children, three girls and two boys, of which Lois was their fourth child.
In 1899, Pastor Richard Lenski was called to serve a parish in Anna, Ohio
Anna, Ohio
Anna is a village in Shelby County, Ohio, United States. The population was 1,319 at the 2000 census.Anna is the location of a Honda Motor Co., Ltd plant that builds the GM L66 engine and Honda J engine....
, and the family moved to the small rural community west of Springfield.
The next twelve years of Lois Lenski's life were spent in Anna, and many of her fondest childhood memories were of life in this small town.
Lenski's autobiography, Journey Into Childhood, provides a detailed description of her years in Anna. Although a strict father and a busy pastor, Richard Lenski always made time for his children and involved them in his hobbies of drawing and photography. Marietta Lenski was a devoted mother and homemaker who encouraged her children to work hard and pursue a college education. Lois Lenski's home life instilled in her the importance of learning. In addition to being an avid reader, she was also skilled at sewing and drawing, often copying pictures from books and magazines.
Since Anna, Ohio was too small a community to offer secondary education, Lois Lenski made a daily train trip to Sidney, Ohio
Sidney, Ohio
Sidney is a city in Shelby County, Ohio, United States. The population was 20,211 at the 2000 census. It is named after English poet Sir Phillip Sidney and is the county seat of Shelby County.Sidney was the recipient of the 1964 All-America City Award...
to attend high school.
She graduated in 1911 and the family moved to Columbus
Columbus, Ohio
Columbus is the capital of and the largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio. The broader metropolitan area encompasses several counties and is the third largest in Ohio behind those of Cleveland and Cincinnati. Columbus is the third largest city in the American Midwest, and the fifteenth largest city...
, where her father joined the faculty at Capital University
Capital University
Capital University is a private liberal arts university of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America located in Bexley, Ohio, founded in 1830. In addition to its rigorous liberal arts program, the university also offers a reputable adult degree program in Columbus, Ohio. It is one of the oldest...
.
Since her father's institution was not co-educational, Lenski enrolled at Ohio State University
Ohio State University
The Ohio State University, commonly referred to as Ohio State, is a public research university located in Columbus, Ohio. It was originally founded in 1870 as a land-grant university and is currently the third largest university campus in the United States...
.
Following in her mother's footsteps, she prepared for a career in teaching.
In addition to education courses, she took as many art courses as possible, primarily drawing and lettering.
In 1915, Lois Lenski graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in education and a teaching certificate.
Although Richard and Marietta Lenski assumed their daughter would settle into a teaching job, Lois chose to deviate from her parent's wishes. At the urging of her art professors from Ohio State, she moved to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
to study at the Art Students League of New York
Art Students League of New York
The Art Students League of New York is an art school located on West 57th Street in New York City. The League has historically been known for its broad appeal to both amateurs and professional artists, and has maintained for over 130 years a tradition of offering reasonably priced classes on a...
.
For the next four years, Lenski took art courses and worked part time to support herself. Although existing on a shoestring budget, Lenski loved the cultural advantages of New York. She took advantage of the opportunities to develop her talent through her classes and part time jobs such as lettering and painting greeting cards or drawing for fashion advertisements. In her class on illustration Lenski first met Arthur Covey
Arthur Covey
Arthur Sinclair Covey was an American muralist known for creating paintings of industrial workers doing their jobs.Covey was born in Leroy, Illinois on June 13, 1877. He died in Tarpon Springs, Florida on February 5, 1960....
. She soon became his assistant in painting a number of murals. In October 1920, Lenski traveled to London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
and Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
to study and work. It was during her months in London that Lenski was first hired to illustrate books for the publisher John Lane
John Lane (publisher)
-Biography:Originally from Devon, where he was born into a farming family, Lane moved to London already in his teens. While working as a clerk at the Railway Clearing House, he acquired knowledge as an autodidact....
.
In 1921, shortly after returning from her travels, Lenski married Arthur Covey. She became thereby a stepmother to his two children, Margaret, age 12 and Laird, age 4. With her additional household and family responsibilities, Lenski had to carve out time for her own work. This often proved a difficult task and Lenski received no help with household chores from her new husband.
Lenski described the 1920s as her years of apprenticeship. Through continued practice and additional art classes, Lenski developed her talent in human figures and landscape drawing. She spent much of her early career as an illustrator of children's books. When a publisher suggested that she write her own story to accompany her drawings, Lenski embarked on a new track in her career. Although she had never considered writing, Lenski was determined to try her hand at being an author and illustrator. In 1927 Lenski published her first book, Skipping Village. The following year she wrote her second book, A Little Girl of 1900, based on her childhood experiences.
In February 1929, Lois Lenski gave birth to her son, Stephen. Within a few months the newly expanded Covey family moved to a farm in Connecticut that would be their home for over 30 years. Spurred by Stephen's toddler years, Lenski began her "Mr. Small" series with The Little Family (1932) and The Little Auto (1934). In the early stages of her writing in the 1930s Lenski wrote "a group of imaginative stories for pure amusement." These included Grandmother Tippytoe, Arabella and Her Aunts and Benny and His Penny. Lenski next moved into historical fiction, beginning with Phebe Fairchild, Her Book (1936), a story based on the Lenski farmhouse in Connecticut, built in 1790. Over the next decade Lenski wrote six more historical books including Bound Girl of Cobble Hill (1938), Blueberry Corners (1940) and Indian Captive (1941). Phebe Fairchild and Indian Captive both were named Newbery Honor books. As a change of pace from her intensely researched historical books, Lenski also published picture books including Sugarplum House (1934) and Gooseberry Garden (1935). She continued to illustrate the works of other writers, most notably Maud Hart Lovelace
Maud Hart Lovelace
Maud Hart Lovelace was an American author best known for the Betsy-Tacy series.-Early life:Maud Palmer Hart was born in Mankato, Minnesota to Tom Hart, a shoe store owner, and his wife, Stella . Maud was the middle child; her sisters were Kathleen and Helen...
's first four Betsy Tacy books. She worked very closely with Lovelace and her publishers to make the books true to their real-life context.
During the 1940s two other major factors, her travels and her grandson, influenced Lois Lenski's writing. Due to poor health, Lenski was ordered by her physician to get away from the fierce Connecticut winters. She and Arthur Covey chose to spend winters in the South, first in Louisiana
Louisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
and then in Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
. It was during her travels that Lenski began research and writing on her series of regional books. Beginning with Bayou Suzette (1943), based on life in the Louisiana backcountry, Lenski wrote some 16 regional books over the next twenty years. Perhaps her most successful regional story was Strawberry Girl (1945), winner of the Newbery Medal in 1946.
Inspired by her grandson, David Chisholm, Margaret's son, Lenski began the "Davy" series of books in the mid-1940s. David lived with his grandparents during the summers of 1943-1945 and was initially a very difficult child. Lenski's grandmotherly kindness finally won him over and his childhood activities became the basis for a series of six picture books including Davy's Day (1943) and A Surprise for Davy (1947).
In the 1950s and early 1960s, Lenski published the Roundabout series, also based on various areas of the U. S., but written for somewhat younger children. Much like the regional series, the Roundabout books explore the geographically and culturally diverse lives of children from peanut farms (Peanuts for Billy Ben, 1952), to cranberry bogs (Berries in the Scoop, 1956) and from housing projects (Project Boy, 1954) to Indian reservations (Little Sioux Girl, 1968).
Although Lenski suffered from illness again in the early 1950s, she gradually recovered and resumed her writing. Lenski and her husband began to spend half the year in Florida and built a house there in 1951. Arthur Covey, a man blessed with near perfect health all his life, became seriously ill in 1958. Although he resumed sketching and painting in their Florida home, he succumbed to his illness in February 1960. In 1964, Lenski sold the Greenacres farm in Connecticut and made her home in Florida year round. She continued writing in her later years, publishing her autobiography in 1972. In September 1974 at 80 years of age, Lois Lenski died at her home in Florida.
Lenski's many books have become classics in children's literature. Her books depicted children's lives much more realistically than other children's authors. She enthusiastically tackled areas and subjects long neglected in writing for children. The popularity of her works and their distribution in other languages are testimony both to her skill as a writer and to her continuing appeal to children.
Her impact on children continues through the Lois Lenski Covey Foundation, a charitable institute whose purpose is to assist organizations in their efforts to provide books to children who might otherwise lack access to children's literature.
Lenski has an elementary school named after her in Centennial Colorado.
Her papers are held at University of California, Berkeley
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...
, and University of North Carolina, Greensboro.
External links
- Complete List of Lenski's books
- Finding Aid for the Lois Lenski Papers, 1915-1970 at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro
- UNCG Special Collections & University Archives past exhibits: Lois Lenski: Voices of Children
- Guide to the Lois Lenski Papers at The Bancroft Library
- Digitized materials from "Houseboat Girl" from the Lois Lenski Collection at Milner Library, Illinois State University.