Happy Birthday! Randolph Caldecott (22 March 1846)

Randolph Caldecott - and a Trivia Quiz

Today is the 167th birthday of one of the most celebrated children's illustrator of all time.  Randolph Caldecott was born in 1846 and was counseled early into a career as a banker/accountant. But his early love was as an artist.  At the age of 15-years-of-age a first article and drawing about a major fire at a hotel in Chester was published in the Illustrated London News.   He, at the age of 15, was also an employee of the Whitchurch & Ellesmere Bank.  At the age of 20 he applied for a job with Manchester & Salford Bank.  As a banker he often drew caricatures of his fellow bank employees.  His move to Manchester allowed him opportunities to develop as an artist too, and in 1872, at the age of twenty-six he resigned his banking position and became a full-time journalist and artist.

Over the next thirteen years Caldecott made an indelible mark in the world of children's literature.  Test your knowledge of Caldecott and his life.

Caldecott Trivia

1. Randolph Caldecott was born in 1846 in what country?
2. Caldecott's first career was in what field?
3. Name one children's picture book written/illustrated by Caldecott.
4. Just 4 days before his 34th birthday Caldecott married, what was the first name of his wife?
5. Caldecott's health was described as fragile -- during his childhood what disease did he suffer from?
6. How old was Caldecott when he died?
7. Where is Caldecott buried?
8.  A plaque was placed in a cathedral in his home town—Chester, and a memorial (designed by Sir Albert Gilbert) was constructed in Caldecott's honor in St. Paul's Cathedral.  What city is St. Paul's Cathedral located?
9. What organization honored Caldecott for his contributions by naming a prestigious award for  "the most distinguished picture book for children" published in the United States, beginning with 1937 publications, and giving that award to the book's illustrator, for the first time in 1838?
10. Who designed the Randolph Caldecott medal presented to the award winner (#9)?
11. Caldecott became one three of the most influential children's illustrators in the nineteenth century (in England), name the other two illustrators.
12. Who won the first award and what was the title of the book?
13. Who won the 75th Caldecott Award?


Answers:

1. England (Chester)
2. Banking
3. Any of these sixteen titles would be correct
   

   The house that Jack built (1878)

   The diverting history of John Gilpin (1878)

   Elegy on the death of a mad dog (1879)

   The babes in the wood (1879)

   The three jovial huntsmen (1880)

   Sing a song for sixpence (1880)

   The farmer’s boy (1881)

   The queen of hearts (1881)

   The milkmaid (1882)

   Hey diddle diddle and Baby Bunting (1882)

   The fox jumps over the parson's gate (1883)

   A frog he would a-wooing go (1883)

   Come lasses and lads (1884)

   Ride a cock horse to Banbury Cross and A farmer went trotting upon his grey mare (1884)

   An elegy on the glory of her sex, Mrs Mary Blaize (1885)

   The Great Panjandrum himself (1885)

4. Marian -- Caldecott married Marian Harriet Brind on March 18, 1880.  Two years later the couple moved to a farm in Surrey, and also purchased a house in Kensington where Caldecott set up his artist's studio. 
5. Rheumatic fever 
6. Age 39.
7. St. Augustine, Florida — Caldecott and his wife sailed to America in October 1885 on a research trip to gather sketches of American life.  After crossing the Atlantic Ocean the couple were met by unusually cold weather as they traveled the east coast. Caldecott developed acute gastritis and died at St. Augustine, Florida on February 13, 1886.  He was buried in Evergreen cemetery in St. Augustine.  He was just 39 years old.
8. London
9. American Library Association (ALA)
10.  René Paul Chambellan designed the Caldecott Medal.
11. Kate Greenaway and Walter Crane.
12. Dorothy P. Lathrop in 1938, for her illustrations in Animals of the Bible: A Picture Book, text selected by Helen Dean Fish. (Stokes, 1937)  A little known fact is that the first edition of this book shows a Christ child sitting on a rock in the Peaceable Kingdom—the child had two left feet.  After the Award was announced the error was discovered and corrected so subsequent editions show the child with a left and a right foot.
13. This Is Not My Hat, written and illustrated by Jon Klassen, published by Candlewick Press.