Recent losses

[Catherine Balkin <Catherine.Balkin@HARPERCOLLINS.COM>]

In the last few months, we've lost four distinguished authors, Myra Cohn
Livingston, Millicent Ellis Selsam, Dr. Roma Gans, and Barbara Esbensen. I'm
posting a little bit of information on each of them below.  We hope you'll join
us in extending sympathy to their families and readers.  They'll be greatly
missed.

MYRA COHN LIVINGSTON

Myra Cohn Livingston, a poet, anthologist and teacher who wrote more than 80
books of poetry for children, died Friday, August 23, 1996, at her home in Los
Angeles.  She was 70.  The cause was cancer.

Mrs. McElderry edited many of Mrs. Livingston's collections, including _Dilly,
Dilly, Piccalilli: Poems for the Very Young_, _If the Owl Calls Again_ and _B
Is for Baby_, which was published this year.  Mrs. Livingston was also
published by several other houses.  A particularly successful thematic series
including _Christmas Poems_, _Celebrations_ and _Birthday Poems_, all
illustrated by Leonard Everett Fisher, is published by Holiday House.  She was
also the author of the critical texts _The Child as Poet: Myth or Reality_ and
_Poem-Making: Ways to Begin Writing Poetry_.

MILLICENT ELLIS SELSAM

Author, Millicent Ellis Selsam, died on Saturday, October 12, 1996, at Mary
Manning Walsh Home in Manhattan.  She was 84 and lived in Manhattan and Fire
Island, Long Island.

A writer of simple science books, she was credited with some 130 titles, scores
of which remain in print, including _How To Be a Nature Detective_, _Greg's
Microscope_, and _Is This a Baby Dinosaur?_ published by HarperCollins.  While
they were tailored for young readers from kindergarten through the early
grades, she also wrote science books for teenagers and a few for adults.

Mrs. Selsam published her first book in 1946, _From Egg to Chick_, after having
taught high school science in the New York City public school system.  This
book came out again in 1970 as a HarperCollins "I Can Read" science book,
titled _Egg to Chick_, and is still available.  Since 1946, Mrs. Selsam's books
found outlets at HarperCollins, Morrow, Macmillan (now Simon & Schuster),
Doubleday and Walker, among other publishers.

She started a series of "I Can Read Science" books for HarperCollins and
regularly contributed to the "First Look at..." series published by Walker.
Both series introduced inquisitive children to the animal kingdom and the
marvels small children discover all around them.

Her books received many awards, including the Thomas Alva Edison Award for the
best juvenile science book, _Biography of an Atom_ (1965).

ROMA GANS

Dr. Roma Gans, an emeritus professor of education at Teachers College of
Columbia University who wrote several classic texts on teaching children to
read, died October 4, 1996 at the Springside Nursing Home in Pittsfield, Mass.
She was 102.

Among her books on teaching reading are several texts still in use, including
_Guiding Children's Reaching Through Experience_, published by Teachers College
in 1942, and _Common Sense in Teaching Reading_ (Bobbs-Merrill, 1963).

In 1929, Dr. Gans joined the faculty at Teachers College, from which she
received a Ph.D in 1940.  The school estimates that 1,000 students passed
through her classes at the college each year.

After retiring from the classroom in 1959, she beame a prolific author of
children's books.  Dr. Gans and Franklyn M. Branley inaugurated the "Let's Read
and Find Out" science series, (first published by T.Y. Crowell, now published
by HarperCollins);  and _Danger--Icebergs!_, _How Do Birds Find Their Way_
(reprinted this year), and _Rock Collecting_ (which will be coming out in a
revised edition in June of 1997 under the title _Let's Go Rock Collecting_)
still remain in print.

BARBARA ESBENSEN

Barbara Esbensen, an Edina, Minnesota teacher and acclaimed children's author,
died Friday, October 25, 1996, at Methodist Hospital in St. Louis Park, after a
brief battle with cancer.  She was 71.

Born in 1925, Esbensen wrote her first children's book, _Swing Around the Sun_,
in 1965, but her career blossomed in the last 10 years.  Her book, _The Star
Maiden_, won a Minnesota Book Award.

In the past 10 years, her work has earned many honors, including the 1994 Award
for Excellence in Poetry for Children given by the National Council of Teachers
of English (NCTE); _Dance With Me_ won the 1996 Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry
Award; _Who Shrank My Grandmother's House_ was one of ALA's Notable Children's
Books of 1993 and a 1993 NCTE Notable Trade Book in the Language Arts.  Her
latest book, _Echoes for the Eye_, was just published by HarperCollins in
April.

Catherine Balkin
Library Promotion Manager
HarperCollins Children's Books
catherine.balkin@harpercollins.com