John Gould (1908-2003)

Here's a book jacket biography of another Maine author, John Thomas Gould, who wrote more than two dozen books and for sixty years a column for The Christian Science Monitor. Born on October 22, 1908, in Brighton, Massachusetts, Gould called Maine home. He edited and published the Lisbon Enterprise, a weekly newspaper in Lisbon Falls, Maine. That's where he met and mentored a young Stephen King. Gould, who seems to me to have been an irreplaceable man, died on September 1, 2003, at the age of ninety-four.

The book by the way is (take a deep breath) The Jonesport Raffle and numerous other Maine veracities researched and methodically arranged by that pleasant humorist-philosopher with a considerable local reputation, as well as a profound sense of scholastic nicety, published by Little, Brown and Company in 1969, and with a jacket design and illustrations by Edward Malsberg.

Original text copyright 2013 Terence E. Hanley

Mary Francis Shura (1923-1991)

Many, many years ago, one of my college English instructors remarked, "As you may know, I was married to a well-known writer . . . ." I never asked him who that writer was. I believe I was supposed to know and may have felt embarrassed that I didn't. In any case, I have wondered over the years who she was, but I have never gone looking for the answer. Instead the answer found me when I found the book Shoefull of Shamrock (originally published in 1965) and decided to show it on my blog.

Mary Francis Shura was born Mary Francis Young on February 23, 1923, in Pratt, Kansas. She studied at Maryville State College in Maryville, Missouri, and in 1943 married Daniel Charles Shura. Shura passed away in 1959. His widow's writing career must have begun at about that time, for her first book, Simple Spigott, was published in 1960. Dozens more books under a bewildering array of pen names followed over the next three decades. None of those names was a pseudonym. On the contrary, they were all combinations of her own name, her initials, and her married names. By the way, Mary's second husband, Raymond C. Craig, whom she married in 1961 and later divorced, was my instructor. A native of Joplin, Missouri, and an army veteran, Dr. Craig worked in publishing before becoming a teacher. Knowledgeable, easygoing, jocular, he was a fine teacher and one of my favorites. When I  knew him, Dr. Craig was working on a project on the humorist Hardin E. Taliaferro (1811-1875). He kept his research bound in string in the top drawer of his desk. I got the impression that it was a project that might never see print, but in 1987, the University of Tennessee Press issued Dr. Craig's book, The Humor of H.E. Taliaferro.

Mary Francis Shura died on January 12, 1991, in Maywood, Illinois. You'll find more on her in the Third Book of Junior Authors. In addition, her obituary appeared in the New York Times on January 15, 1991. Wikipedia has an entry on her, but information on Wikipedia should always be taken with a grain of salt. Finally, Mary's papers are located at the University of Oregon Libraries.

Cover illustration by Cathy Pavia
Text copyright 2013 Terence E. Hanley

Stephen Longstreet (1907-2002)

A book jacket can't begin to tell of the experiences and accomplishments of Stephen Longstreet. Born Chauncey Weiner or Wiener (you can see why he changed his name) on April 18, 1907, in New York City, Longstreet was an artist, novelist, playwright, scriptwriter, and author of works on jazz, travel, automobiles, and other non-fiction topics. His books numbered over one hundred. A Few Painted Feathers, from which this book jacket bio is drawn, is a novel of the American Revolution and was published in 1963. Longstreet died in Los Angeles on February 20, 2002.

Front jacket photo by James Viles

Text copyright 2012 Terence E. Hanley

Ralph C. Higgins (1921-1995)

Here's a cute little book I found at the local library book sale, Fantasies of Old Mr. Frost by Ralph C. Higgins (New York: Carlton Press, 1970). The author was born on January 3, 1921, and served in the U.S. Navy during World War II. Mr. Higgins died on November 30, 1995, and is buried at the Maine Veterans' Memorial Cemetery in Augusta. The jacket design is by Ellen Werblow.

Text copyright 2012 Terence E. Hanley

Lawrence & Elisabeth Hanson

As their book jacket bio says, Lawrence and Elisabeth Hanson were a husband-and-wife team of biographers. Their subjects included Toulouse-Lautrec, Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, George Eliot, the Bronte family, Paul Verlaine, and Tchaikovsky. The irony is that biographical information about the Hansons is lacking, at least on the Internet. But at least I can offer these images and a little snippet of their lives. If you were casting a film of their own biographies, you might choose Peter O'Toole to play the husband and Jean Simmons to play the wife. The jacket design is by Leo Manso.

Text copyright 2012 Terence E. Hanley

E. Harper Johnson & Burl Ives

Today I found a worn and moldy copy of Albad the Oaf, a children's book by Burl Ives, published in 1965. I have always thought that Burl Ives is a little bit creepy, but I'm not writing today to show his book-jacket biography. Instead, I would like to talk about the illustrator, E. Harper Johnson. Unfortunately, I know very little about him, not even a date or place of birth. All I know is that he was an illustrator, comic book artist, violinist, and opera singer. He may also have been an archaeologist. Johnson illustrated many books in the 1950s and '60s, especially biographies and historical books for children. At least two of those books were by the poet Arna Bontemps. Johnson's illustrations for Ageless Africa: A Pictorial History of the Golden Past by William Leo Hansberry appeared in Ebony magazine in 1965. I'm not sure that the book was ever published, as Hansberry died in November of that year. In any case, the artist Johnson lived on Long Island in 1965. He later married Salma Tahira Malik (Aug. 8, 1928-Oct. 10, 1979, Beverly Hills, California).

Text copyright 2012 Terence E. Hanley

Edwin Way Teale (1899-1980)

Author and naturalist Edwin Way Teale (1899-1980) wrote nearly three dozen books, including a series on his journeys through the four seasons. North with the Spring (1951) was the first book in the series. Autumn Across America (1956) and Journey Into Summer (1960) followed. The last, Wandering Through Winter (1965), won a Pulitzer Prize. Teale was born in Illinois, but it's no small source of pride for Hoosiers like me to know that he got his start as a naturalist on his grandparents' Indiana farm or that he received his undergraduate degree from an Indiana college (Earlham, 1922).

Text copyright 2012 Terence E. Hanley