A Family Favorite

I heard on the news today while commuting back to Annapolis, Jan Berenstain had died. The books she and her husband wrote about a family of bears were favorites in our home - all four kids grew up with them. We still have a stack of them in our den - some of them have traveled many miles - from room to room, as well distance between moves between California and Oregon, and Oregon to Maryland. Being from Pennsylvania, there was a good article about her in today's Philadelphia Inquirer. I have a fondness for children's books, live seems to get summed up pretty well in them - these are among the best that do that. Others thought so as well, Stan and Jan Berenstain sold more than 250-million books.

Jan Berenstain, July 26, 1923 – February 24, 2012

My Jan has a degree in Early Childhood Education. I remember her once taking a class in Children's Literature from a professor at Fresno State who made a career on the topic. A quick search on the Web showed that there is an entire department in the university's library dedicated to the subject. The professor had a passion for children's books. Of the more than 50,000 titles of books and related media in the library, 22,000 came from his personal collection. That is something I could have gotten into as well.