Elizabite: The Story of the Book - Part V

 

          Call Me Charley (Harper, 1945), author Jesse Jackson’s first young adult novel, is dedicated to Hans and Margret Rey. As Leonard Marcus notes in Dear Genius: The Letters of Ursula Nordstrom, Jackson had met the couple at a Bread Loaf writer’s conference in the early 1940s. Jackson’s work drew the praise of Wallace Stegner, who advised him to stop by Harper and Brothers on his way home and show his work to Ursula Nordstrom, editor of the juvenile department.          

           Jackson's initial efforts did not meet with approval, however. Upon hearing Nordstrom's doubts about Jackson's ability to produce a publishable book, the Reys became his mentors. Hans provided his studio for Jackson to use, while Margret coached him on writing. 

 

Hans, Jesse Jackson, Margret and Charcoal on 5th Avenue

Curious George Takes a Job

Houghton Mifflin, 1947



          No doubt Jackson told the couple about why he was writing the book and of his experience as a juvenile probation officer in 1936 when three young black boys, fourteen to sixteen years old “had been sentenced to life terms in the Ohio State Penitentiary for robbing a restaurant and killing the owner for five dollars.” As he interviewed the young men, Jackson learned that they had dropped out of school “because they were too embarrassed to tell their teachers they couldn’t read.” 
 

Harper & Brothers, 1945

            During the early months of 1945 Margret too was working on a book about a spotted bunny who also suffered discrimination for being different. Spotty was not the first book published by Margret with her own byline; Pretzel had been issued in 1944. It was, however, with the exception of Curious George Goes to the Hospital (Houghton Mifflin, 1966) the only book the Reys created with a purpose in mind. Hans spoke of this in a 1959 newspaper article when he reflected that Spotty’s “ordeals teach a subtle lesson in mutual tolerance.” In November 1947 Spotty was selected along with Jackson’s second book, Anchor Man, to be included in the 1948 Children’s Reading for Democracy List sponsored by the American Brotherhood of the National Conference of Christians and Jews. The Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith included Spotty in its bibliography of recommended books well into the 1950s.

“Elizabite: The Story of the Book” is based on “From Elizabite to Spotty: The Reys, Race and Consciousness Raising,” an essay published in the Children’s Literature Association Quarterly, Vol. 35, #4, Winter 2012.