A Brief History of the Field

Abstract

The book starts with an historical look at how the interconnected fields of children’s librarianship and publishing arose, providing a comparative base for the chapters that follow. In the USA, the field of literary cultural production for young people began with the library and the publishing house working in tandem. Views from the Progressive Era influenced first librarianship, which in turn influenced publishing for young people, as publishers recognized a burgeoning market in books for young people, and established children’s imprints within their houses, starting with Louise Seaman Bechtel at Macmillan in 1919. This chapter visits shifts in the field, from the earliest days of Anne Carroll Moore at the New York Public library and Louise Seaman Bechtel, the first children’s editor, at Macmillan, during which time publishers and librarians served as child protectors in their selections, to a shift at the mid-century, when Margaret Edwards at the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore shifted from child protector to child educator—wanting young adults especially to be informed about the Cold War and peace, to a shift in the 1970s when librarians officially became child advocates instead of child protectors. In the library, this was reflected by content in Carol Starr’s Young Adult Alternative Newsletter, which was circulated to 1000 librarians, and in the publishing house, with the 1967 publication of The Outsiders, which marked the beginning of realist fiction for young adults. Another shift began with the mergers and acquisitions of the 1980s, and a new commercialism emerged, as publishing for young people was finally considered a profitable business.