Eloise Greenfield facts for kids
Eloise Greenfield (born May 17, 1929 – died August 5, 2021) was a famous American author and poet. She wrote many books for children, including picture books, novels, and biographies. People loved her writing because of its beautiful rhythm and how she showed the positive experiences of African Americans.
Eloise Greenfield started writing poems and songs in the 1950s. After trying for many years, her first poem was published in 1962. In 1972, she published her first children's book. She wrote 48 books in total! Her goal was to show real but positive stories about African-American families, friendships, and communities. She also worked hard to help other African-American writers get their books published.
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About Eloise Greenfield
Eloise Greenfield was born as Eloise Little in Parmele, North Carolina. She grew up in Washington, D.C. during a tough time called the Great Depression. Even so, she had a happy childhood in the Langston Terrace housing project. She was the second of five children.
As a child, Eloise was shy and loved to study. She also enjoyed music and took piano lessons. She experienced racism firsthand when visiting her grandparents in the southern U.S., where places were separated by race. She finished high school in 1946 and went to Miner Teachers College until 1949. However, she realized she was too shy to be a teacher and left college.
Becoming a Writer
Greenfield started working for the government at the U.S. Patent Office. She found the work boring and also faced unfair treatment because of her race. In the 1950s, she began writing poems and song lyrics. After many years of sending her work to publishers, her first poem, "To a Violin," was finally published in 1962.
In 1960, she left her job to spend more time with her children. She took temporary jobs and kept writing. In the 1960s, some of her work appeared in magazines. In 1971, she joined a group called the District of Columbia Black Writers Workshop. This group helped her start writing books for children.
Her first children's book, Bubbles, came out in 1972. A friend encouraged her to write a picture book biography, so she wrote Rosa Parks in 1973. Talking about this book helped her become less afraid of speaking in public. Eloise Greenfield went on to publish 48 children's books! She once said she wanted to "choose and order words that children will celebrate."
Her Books and Stories
Eloise Greenfield was sad about how Black people and communities were shown in the media. So, she decided to write stories that were real but also positive. She focused on strong relationships within African-American families and friendships.
For example, in her book Sister (1974), a young girl deals with losing a parent with help from her family. Me and Nessie (1975) is about best friends. Her first book, Bubbles (1972), showed loving African-American parents working hard for their families. It also showed children facing challenges with a positive attitude.
In She Come Bringing Me that Little Baby Girl (1974), a boy learns to share his parents' love when his baby sister arrives. Alesia (1981) tells the brave story of a girl who had an accident as a child. Night on Neighborhood Street (1991) is a collection of poems about everyday life in a city neighborhood.
One of her most famous books is Honey, I Love, first published in 1978. It's a collection of poems for all ages about the daily lives and loving relationships of children and families. Her book Childtimes: A Three-Generation Memoir (1979), which she wrote with her mother, tells about her happy childhood. She explained why she liked writing biographies:
People are a part of their time. They are affected, during the time that they live, by the things that happen in their world. Big things and small things. A war, an invention such as radio or television, a birthday party, a kiss. All of these help to shape the present and the future. If we could know more about our ancestors, about the experiences they had when they were children, and after they had grown up, too, we would know much more about what has shaped us and our world.
Helping Other Writers
In 1971, Greenfield started working with the District of Columbia Black Writers' Workshop. She helped lead the children's literature section. This group wanted to help more African-American writers get their books published.
She also taught creative writing in schools. She gave talks and free workshops about writing children's books for African-American authors. She was a member of important groups like the National Literary Hall of Fame for Writers of African Descent. After 1991, most of her books were illustrated by Jan Spivey Gilchrist. Even when she had trouble seeing and hearing later in life, she kept speaking and publishing books with her daughter's help. The Ezra Jack Keats Foundation said that Greenfield "broadened the path toward a more diverse American literature for children."
Awards and Honors
Eloise Greenfield received many awards for her amazing work. Her book Childtimes won a Boston Globe–Horn Book Award. In 1983, she won the Washington, DC Mayor's Art Award in Literature and the Jane Addams Children's Book Award.
She also won the Award for Excellence in Poetry for Children. She received a lifetime achievement award in 1993. In 2013, she got the Living Legacy Award.
Greenfield won a Coretta Scott King Award for her 1976 book Africa Dream. This award is given to African-American authors and illustrators of children's books. She also received the Coretta Scott King–Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2018. Several of her other books, like The Great Migration: Journey to the North and Night on Neighborhood Street, also received Coretta Scott King honors.
When she accepted an award in 2016, she said:
Our work is [continued] so that children can see themselves in books, see their beauty and intelligence, see the strengths they have inherited from a long line of predecessors, see their ability to overcome difficulties, challenges, pain, and find deep joy and laughter in books, in characters they recognize as themselves.
Personal Life
Eloise Greenfield lived in Washington, D.C., for most of her life. In 1950, she married Robert J. Greenfield, a friend who had served in World War II. They had a son, Steven, and a daughter, Monica. They later divorced. Eloise Greenfield loved music and played the piano.
She passed away from a stroke on August 5, 2021, at the age of 92.
Selected works
- Fiction
- Bubbles (1972, illustrated by Eric Marlow, later reprinted as Good News)
- She Comes Bringing Me that Little Baby Girl (1974, illustrated by John Steptoe)
- Sister (1974, illustrated by Moneta Barnett)
- Me and Neesie (1975, illustrated by Moneta Barnett)
- First Pink Light (1976, illustrated by Barnett)
- Africa Dream (1976, illustrated by Carole Byard; Coretta Scott King Award winner)
- I Can Do It by Myself (1978, with her mother, Lessie Jones Little, illustrated by Byard)
- Talk About a Family (1978, illustrated by James Calvin)
- Darlene (1980, illustrated by George Ford)
- Grandmama's Joy (1980, illustrated by Byard)
- Grandpa's Face (1988, illustrated by Floyd Cooper)
- Big Friend, Little Friend (1991, illustrated by Jan Spivey Gilchrist)
- I Make Music (1991, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Lisa's Daddy and Daughter Day (1991, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- My Doll, Keshia (1991, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- My Daddy and I (1991, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Koya DeLaney and the Good Girl Blues (1992)
- Aaron and Gayla's Alphabet Book (1993, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- William and the Good Old Days (1993, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Sweet Baby Coming (1994, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Honey, I Love (1995 picture book, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- On My Horse (1995, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Easter Parade (1998, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Water, Water (1999)
- MJ and Me (1999)
- Grandma's Joy (1999)
- The Friendly Four (2006, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Thinker: my puppy poet and me" (2019, illustrated by Ehsan Abdollahi)
- Alaina and the Great Play (2021, illustrated by Colin Bootman)
- Biographies and non-fiction
- Rosa Parks (1973, illustrated by Eric Marlow)
- Paul Robeson (1975, illustrated by Ford; Jane Addams Children's Book Award winner)
- Mary McLeod Bethune (1977, illustrated by Pinkney)
- Childtimes: A Three-Generation Memoir (1979, with her mother, L. J. Little, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney)
- Alesia (1981, with Alesia Revis, illustrated by Ford, with photographs by Sandra Turner Bond)
- For the Love of the Game: Michael Jordan and Me (1997, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- How They Got Over: African Americans and the Call of the Sea (2003, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- The Women Who Caught the Babies: A Story of African American Midwives (2019, illustrated by Daniel Minter)
- Poetry
- Honey, I Love and Other Poems (1978, illustrated by Leo and Diane Dillon)
- Daydreamers (1981, illustrated by Tom Feeling)
- Nathaniel Talking (1988, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Under the Sunday Tree (1988, illustrated by Amos Ferguson)
- Night on Neighborhood Street (1991, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Angels (1998, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- I Can Draw a Weeposaur and Other Dinosaurs (2001, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- In the Land of Words (2004, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- When the horses ride by: Children in the times of war (2006, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- Brothers & Sisters (2008, illustrated by Gilchrist)
- The Great Migration: Journey to the North (2011, illustrated by Gilchrist)
