Sometimes prestigious awards are named after some pretty sketchy people (Pulitzer and Nobel come to mind). But after learning more about him, I’ve concluded that John Newbery (1713 – 1767) deserves to have his name associated with the most prestigious award in children’s book writing.

As every children’s book author, librarian, and publisher knows, the Newbery medal is awarded annually to the author of the best American children’s book. (The Caldecott goes to the best illustrated book.) This year’s hugely deserving recipient went to Katherine Applegate for her fantastic The One and Only Ivan (which you really, really ought to read if you haven’t yet).

So, want to know a little more about John Newbery? He was an 18th century writer, publisher, and patent-medicine manufacturer; he was a big fan of Locke and Rousseau, and he published children’s books during the height of the English Enlightenment.

Newbery was not the first children’s book publisher. But he was the first who actually seemed to—cough—like children. Before Newbery arrived on the scene, the few books in existence that were aimed at kids mostly threatened eternal hellfire and damnation for misbehavior, with cheery titles like: A Token for Children; Being an Exact Account of the Conversion, Holy and Exemplary Lives, and Joyful Deaths of Several Small Children.” (James Janeway, 1671)

Newbery, in contrast, was heavily influenced by Enlightenment thinkers like Locke and Voltaire. His first children’s book was A Little Pretty Pocket-Book (1744) and its motto was Delectando monemus (instruction with delight). Its author is anonymous but is generally believed to have been Newbery himself.

Rather than terrifying kids into submission, Pretty Pocketbook preyed on kids’ self-interest. It promised “to teach Children the Use of the English Alphabet, by Way of Diversion.” It promised kids that if they said their prayers, studied hard, and bowed when their parent walked into the room, they’d one day “ride in a coach and six” and would “know how to behave so as to make every Body love them.”

Newbery was also a savvy marketer. He transformed the book trade from expensive volumes owned by the aristocracy to mass-market capitalism. He advertised heavily, plugged his other products in his books, and offered discounts to teachers and booksellers who bought his products in bulk. He was the first children’s publisher to employ a staff of decent illustrators. He published a variety of genres besides children’s books, including how-to books for housewives, dictionaries, and the works of Voltaire.

Pretty Pocketbook cost just sixpence, but for eightpence, you could get it with a ball and pincushion “the Use of which will infallibly make Tommy a good Boy, and Polly a good Girl.” And he even threw in “A Little Song-Book.”

Newbery got rich not so much through his publishing business, but by his patent-medicine products. In 1746 he patented, manufactured and sold Dr James’s Fever Powder, and advertised it as effective against gout, rheumatism, scrofula, scurvy, leprosy, and distemper (in cattle). Newbery pretty flagrantly worked brand endorsements into his literature. In his popular The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes (1765) (the first-ever children’s novel), the main character is orphaned when her father is “seized with a violent fever in a place where Dr. James’s Fever Powder was not to be had, and where he died miserably.”

Newbery’s books became popular in America as well, enthusiastically endorsed and imported by Benjamin Franklin. (The images posted here are from the American editions of Newbery’s books.)

reference: Jonathan Rose, “John Newbery,” The British Literary Book Trade, 1700 – 1820, pp 216 – 228 Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 1995

Images from Library of Congress: http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=rbc3&fileName=rbc0001_2003juv05880page.db