Thacher Hurd papers

Collection

Call Number: GEN MSS 1703

Scope and Contents

The collection consists of original artwork, writings, dummies, proofs, photographs, notebooks and sketchbooks, publishing correspondence and contracts, printed materials, memorabilia, and computer and audiovisual media documenting the career of children’s book author Thacher Hurd.

Included are illustrations and manuscripts for Mama Don’t Allow, Art Dog, Zoom City, and Moo Cow Kaboom!, as well as unpublished works by Hurd and books he illustrated for other authors. The collection also contains photographs and artwork for projects unrelated to his children’s books, files related to Peaceable Kingdom Press, and a small amount of personal papers, which include early drawings and paintings by Hurd and artwork he created in college. Among the correspondents are Clement Hurd, Edith Thacher Hurd, Olivia Scott Hurd, James Marshall, Clyde Robert Bulla, Helen Frost, and Susan Terris, in addition to his literary agency Curtis Brown Ltd., and editors and executives from Harper & Row, Crown Publishers, and Henry Holt and Co.

Dates

1949 - 2017

Creator

Hurd, Thacher (Author)

Conditions Governing Access

This collection is open for research.

Box 40 (computer media): Restricted fragile material. Access copies of digital files may be requested. Consult Access Services for further information.

Box 41 (audiovisual materials): Restricted fragile material. Reference copies may be requested. Consult Access Services for further information.

Conditions Governing Use

The Thatcher Hurd Papers is the physical property of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Literary rights, including copyright, belong to the authors or their legal heirs and assigns. For further information, consult the appropriate curator.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Purchased from John Windle Antiquarian Bookseller on the Jockey Hollow Fund and the Edwin J. Beinecke Book Fund, 2019.

Arrangement

Organized into seven series: I. Children’s Books, 1950-2017. II. Photographs, Artwork, and Printed Materials, 1972-2017, undated. III. Correspondence, 1968-2016, undated. IV. Journals and Notebooks, 1976-2014, undated. V. Peaceable Kingdom Press, 1983-2002. VI. Personal Papers, 1949-2003. VII. Computer and Audiovisual Media, 1993-2004, undated.

Extent

50.93 Linear Feet ((41 boxes) + 1 art, 1 broadside)

Language of Materials

English

Catalog Record

A record for this collection is available in Orbis, the Yale University Library catalog

Persistent URL

https://hdl.handle.net/10079/fa/beinecke.thurd

Additional Description

Abstract

Thacher Hurd (1949-)

Thacher Hurd, son of children’s book creators Clement Hurd and Edith Thacher Hurd, is the author and illustrator of more than 25 books for children, including Mystery on the Docks (1983), Mama Don’t Allow (1984), Pea Patch Jig (1986), Art Dog (1996), Zoom City (1998), Moo Cow Kaboom! (2003), and Bongo Fishing (2011). Hurd was born in 1949 in Burlington, Vermont and graduated from the California College of Arts and Crafts. He published his first book, The Old Chair, in 1978. His works have been adapted into spoken books, a musical, and an opera. Mama Don’t Allow won the Boston Globe Horn Book Award and was named one of Time Magazine’s “100 Best Children’s Books of all Time.” In 1983 Thacher and his wife Olivia Scott Hurd founded Peaceable Kingdom Press, a publisher of cards and posters adapted from children’s books. Thacher and Olivia Hurd live in Berkeley, California, and have two children, Manton and Nicholas.

Processing Information

Collections are processed to a variety of levels, depending on the work necessary to make them usable, their perceived research value, the availability of staff, competing priorities, and whether or not further accruals are expected. The library attempts to provide a basic level of preservation and access for all collections as they are acquired, and does more extensive processing of higher priority collections as time and resources permit.

Information included in the Description of Papers note and Collection Contents section is drawn from information supplied with the collection and from an initial survey of the contents. Folder titles appearing in the contents list below are based on those provided by the creator or previous custodian. Titles have not been verified against the contents of the folders in all cases. Folder titles in brackets were supplied by staff during processing.

This finding aid may be updated periodically to account for new acquisitions to the collection and/or revisions in arrangement and description.

Subjects

Finding Aid & Administrative Information

Title: Guide to the Thacher Hurd Papers
Status: Completed
Author: by Brooke McManus
Date: July 2021
Description rules: Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description note: Finding aid written in English.

Repository Details

Part of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library Repository

http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/

Contact:
P. O. Box 208330
New Haven CT 06520-8330 US
(203) 432-2977
beinecke.library@yale.edu

Location

121 Wall Street
New Haven, CT 06511

Opening Hours

Access Information

The Beinecke Library is open to all Yale University students and faculty, and visiting researchers whose work requires use of its special collections. You will need to bring appropriate photo ID the first time you register. Beinecke is a non-circulating, closed stack library. Paging is done by library staff during business hours. You can request collection material online at least two business days in advance of your visit, using the request links in Archives at Yale. For more information, please see Planning Your Research Visit and consult the Reading Room Policies prior to visiting the library.

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