Dr. Seuss was the author for this month’s Virtual Book Club for Kids, so I was thrilled when Emma brought this Dr. Seuss History Maker Bio home from the library! Theodor Seuss Geisel was a fun author for my art-loving and rhyme-loving kids to learn more about! He’s even a local author – born in Springfield, Massachusetts. We’ll have to take our kids to Dartmouth College sometime (his alma mater). We learned from the book that Seuss also spent a couple years in England, studying for a doctorate in literature, so we pulled up the photos we took when we visited Oxford with six-month-old Emma – we were living in Cambridge, England, at the time, so it was only a bus ride away!
Seuss never did get his doctorate, but he met and married his wife, Helen Palmer, while he was there!
I had to include this photo of Emma in one of the great halls at Oxford – her super-excited expression seemed perfect for an article about Seuss! This hall – in Christ Church College (Oxford University is made up of several different colleges, which can be a bit confusing to Americans) – was also, apparently, used in at least one of the Harry Potter films.
What is your favorite Dr. Seuss book? I’ve always been partial to And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street! Follow the links below for lots of fun activities for kids to go along with this month’s author!
MaryAnne is a craft loving educator, musician, photographer, and writer who lives in Silicon Valley with her husband Mike and their four children.
We love Dr. Seuss books! Emma sure looks happy to be visiting his alma mater. :)
She loved going new places as a baby!
I cannot pick a favorite, but was interested to learn that Mulberry Street was his first children’s book coming well before all the others!
It’s so fun to unearth information about Dr. Seuss. He has so many aliases that he feels mysterious to me! I had no idea he was from Springfield, went to Dartmouth or studied in England. What fun to find out more about him!
Super cute story! We love Dr. Seuss. My favorite has always been One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish. It was the first book I remember “reading” (aka memorizing).
J likes the Lorax, which I never read till last year. His school does Dr. Seuss week in March, coinciding with Dr. Seuss’ birthday.
I love that one for very young kids!
Oh my goodness…that picture of Emma is adorable. What an expression! Dr. Seuss is a favorite in our home too (where isn’t he?). I’m partial to Oh, The Places You’ll Go. We love to travel as a family so this story always speaks to me.
That is the perfect Seuss book for travel!
I love how you pulled the history of Dr Suess all together in a personal way.
Adorable Emma.
Thank you, Malika!
That is the cutest picture of you! :)
Thanks! :)
Hey Mama!
Loving the sling, and the perfect happy little girl!
I so love England. The architecture certainly is amazing! It gives me hope that Dr. Seuss never finished his doctorate. Maybe I can still be wildly successful – just with a MS. Hhhhmmmm?
I love this post and I love Dr. Seuss. My daughter is memorizing some of his poems and books for her Suzuki Violin Class. I am learning to love him even more. His words must be born of God, because they are perfect in every way.
Of course you can be wildly successful! Oh, the Places You’ll Go… ;)
The pictures are fabulous!!!! I went to a Seuss museum in the Dallas area growing up. Crazy place. :) My favourites are his tongue twisters.
I’ll have to go to that museum if we ever make it to Dallas!
We adore Dr. Seuss and The Lorax is our absolute favorite. My girls love to exclaim, “We speak for the trees!” Pre kids my husband and I visited the Dr. Seuss Memorial Garden (I think that’s where Lynda is referring to) and the statues are incredible. I really hope we can return with the kids one day. http://www.catinthehat.org/memorial.htm
I would love to hear your girls exclaim, “We speak for the trees!”
oh, love the look on Emma’s face. It is so hard to pick one Dr.Seuss book. I like “oh the places you will go”, my son now like the one we just got – The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins.
I haven’t read The 500 Hats – will have to look for a copy!
Love this! What were you living in Cambridge for? Love the pictures and love Dr. Seuss!
My husband had an internship in Cambridge. We loved it there!
Lovely photos! I think The Lorax is my favorite, but Anna really liked Mulberry Street too.
I think The Lorax is Emma’s favorite :)
What great connections you have to Dr Seuss and I love her face in the picture in the great hall. I’ve never been to Oxford (shock horror) but it’s on our places to visit list with the kids.
Of the books we’ve got so far I really like Wocket in my Pocket but J love The Foot Book and T Mr Brown Can Moo
I love Wocket in my Pocket!
I preferred Cambridge over Oxford, but maybe that is just because we actually lived in Cambridge?
There are some statues/monuments to Seuss in Springfield, MA that I’ve been wanting to check out for a long time…maybe Seuss’ birthday next month would be just the time to do that! My favorite Seuss book is The Lorax, but we read a lot of The Grinch at Christmastime!
And those pictures are awesome! :)
I’ll have to take my kids on a field trip to Springfield to see those statues!
What a great idea to learn about the author, and it’s extra special that he’s local!
I hadn’t realized he was local until we started reading about it – it was a neat discovery!
Haha! She does look like a Seuss character! Anna does that expression now.
I was thinking that they look quite a bit alike – Emma’s the age Anna is now in these pictures!
Even though I’ve been to Dartmouth many times for work, I’ve never checked out the Suess study room, but I bet you would like it. http://www.dartmouth.edu/~vox/0607/0430/suess.html As for favorites, hard to pick one, but I’m partial to the Grinch.
We definitely need to check out that study room!
I thought learning about Seuss’ childhood was really fascinating to me.
Hey, the comment luv box is working for me now!
He is a pretty fascinating person!
I changed my server host, and I think that fixed my commentluv problem. So glad it is working for you now!
I adore that first picture of you. A young mom, so happy, in a beautiful setting, and off to learn about one of the most beloved children’s author, just wonderful.
We really loved our time in the UK!
Great photos! I love that excited face!
She was such a fun baby to take places – she loved seeing new things!