Dr. Seuss

Background

Theodor Seuss Geisel was born on March 2, 1904, in Springfield, Massachusetts, and his grandparents were German immigrants. He grew up around a wealthy extended family during World War I, which helped shape his patriotism. As a scout, he sold War bonds, and as the story goes, he sold so many that he was to be honored by President Theodor Roosevelt. However, Roosevelt only had nine medals, leaving young Seuss without a medal. Teddy asked, “What’s this boy doing here?” Ever since, Seuss suffered stage fright.

Seuss graduated from high school in 1921 and attended Dartmouth College, where he joined a humor magazine called the Dartmouth Jack-O-Lantern. He would eventually become editor-in-chief of the publication, but when he was caught drinking, he was forced to resign. This was the time of Prohibition, and there was a zero-tolerance policy.

Seuss drew over 400 political cartoons for the New York Daily newspaper during World War II called PM. Many were politically charged against the dictators Hitler and Mussolini, and Japanese Americans were depicted as latent traitors. In them, he also supported President Roosevelt and critiqued Congress. He wrote films for the U.S. Air Force.

By the 1950s, he wrote children’s books after the war in La Jolla, California, under the pen name Dr. Seuss. Some of these were The Cat in the Hat, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and Green Eggs and Ham, and he continued to write until his death on September 24, 1991. His legacy lives on as his beloved children’s books sell well and inspire young people to read. In 1997, the National Education Association chose his birthday to celebrate reading, and the first Read Across America Day was held in 1998.