Five from the Kerlan Collection

I spent a short while a few days ago perusing the exhibit The ABC of It: Why Children's Books Matter at the Andersen Library on the University of Minnesota campus. Mostly it reminded me of all the amazing materials available at the Kerlan Collection, just a few miles from my house, that I will never see. But because of the exhibit, they had a few gems on display.


I never heard of Wanda Gág or her book Millions of Cats until I moved to Minnesota, but unlike many other Minnesota-centric cultural items, this one is worth the adoration. Shown here is Gág's watercolor sketch for the cover (the final art is viewable here). I also was drawn to the ink drawing of a tiny kitty sleeping under the plant.


I'm not sure I knew the Kerlan Collection had anything from Virginia Lee Burton, who I've written about quite a lot in the past. I'm especially fond of her book The Little House, from which they have these watercolor and gouache paintings.


Nine Days to Christmas holds a special place in my childhood. I never saw it in a library or had a copy at home; instead, I read it only when I went to the dentist my family visited until I was about 10 years old. I never new what its name was until I saw it on a list of Caldecott Medal-winners some time after I was an adult. (I learned what a piñata is from this book.)


I loved Garth Williams' illustrations in other books (especially The Whispering Rabbit and Other Stories), but I never heard of the Little Fur Family until Daughter Number Three-Point-One was little and we were given a copy as a gift. This is a first edition with a rabbit fur cover, signed on the title page by both Williams and Margaret Wise Brown, the author.


Vera B. Williams' A Chair for My Mother, published in 1982, was a favorite book when DN3.1 was in elementary school. It was lovely to see this bright watercolor and have it bring back the times we would sit with the story at bed time.