Green eggs and ham

Flagg-Rochelle Public Library Director Sarah Flanagan
Posted 3/15/22

We are lucky to have a supported library and a collection of over 60,000 volumes in our community.

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Green eggs and ham

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We are lucky to have a supported library and a collection of over 60,000 volumes in our community. Our collection includes a variety of titles and all types of genres. In March, we always search our vast collection for books with green covers or green in the title to display at the library. This month is Dr. Seuss’s Birthday. He wrote one of my favorite books that starts with the word green, Green Eggs and Ham.

“Theodor Geisel, better known to the world as Dr. Seuss, the author and illustrator of such children’s books as ‘The Cat in the Hat’ and ‘Green Eggs and Ham,’ is born in Springfield, Massachusetts on March 2, 1904. Geisel, who used his middle name (which was also his mother’s maiden name) as his pen name, wrote 48 books — including some for adults — that have sold well over 200 million copies and been translated into multiple languages. Dr. Seuss books are known for their whimsical rhymes and quirky characters, which have names like the Lorax and the Sneetches and live in places like Whoville.

Geisel graduated from Dartmouth College, where he was editor of the school’s humor magazine, and studied at Oxford University. There he met Helen Palmer, his first wife and the person who encouraged him to become a professional illustrator. Back in America, Geisel worked as a cartoonist for a variety of magazines and in advertising.

The first children’s book that Geisel wrote and illustrated, ‘And to Think That I Saw It On Mulberry Street,’ was rejected by over two dozen publishers before making it into print in 1937. Geisel’s first bestseller, ‘The Cat in the Hat,’ was published in 1957. The story of a mischievous cat in a tall striped hat came about after his publisher asked him to produce a book using 220 new-reader vocabulary words that could serve as an entertaining alternative to the school reading primers children found boring.” (https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/dr-seuss-born).

Do you like green eggs and ham? Libraries are places where you can relax, read and express your imagination. You gain knowledge and learn about many subjects. Think of all of the information that is stored in the books in our building just waiting to be unlocked.  Come in, bring your library card, choose a book and let your imagination soar. 

Sarah Flanagan is the library director of the Flagg-Rochelle Public Library District.