Donald Crews (born August 30, 1938) is an American

illustrator An illustrator is an artist who specializes in enhancing writing or elucidating concepts by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text or idea. The illustration may be intended to clarify complicate ...

and writer of children's

picture book A picture book combines visual and verbal narratives in a book format, most often aimed at young children. With the narrative told primarily through text, they are distinct from comics, which do so primarily through sequential images. The ima ...

s. In 2015, the

American Library Association The American Library Association (ALA) is a nonprofit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world. History 19th century ...

(ALA) honored him with the

Children's Literature Legacy Award The Children's Literature Legacy Award (formerly the ''Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal'' or ''Wilder Award'') is a prize awarded by the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), to writers ...

, recognizing his lasting contribution to children's literature. His works ''

Freight Train A freight train, also called a goods train or cargo train, is a railway train that is used to carry cargo, as opposed to passengers. Freight trains are made up of one or more locomotives which provide propulsion, along with one or more railroad ...

'' (1978) and ''Truck'' (1980) were

Caldecott Honor The Randolph Caldecott Medal, frequently shortened to just the Caldecott, annually recognizes the preceding year's "most distinguished American picture book for children". It is awarded to the illustrator by the Association for Library Service ...

recipients.

Early life

Donald Crews was born in

Newark, New Jersey Newark ( , ) is the List of municipalities in New Jersey, most populous City (New Jersey), city in the U.S. state of New Jersey, the county seat of Essex County, New Jersey, Essex County, and a principal city of the New York metropolitan area. ...

in 1938. His mother worked as a seamstress, and his father worked at the railroad and several other odd jobs. Raised in Newark, Crews spent summers at his grandparents' home in rural Cottondale, Florida, with his mother and three siblings. These summers were inspiration for the autobiographical books ''Bigmama's'' (1991) and ''Shortcut'' (1992). Encouraged by a high school teacher, Crews pursued art as a career. He attended

Cooper Union The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, commonly known as Cooper Union, is a private college on Cooper Square in Lower Manhattan, New York City. Peter Cooper founded the institution in 1859 after learning about the government-s ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

and graduated in 1959. While at Cooper Union, Crews met his future wife, graphic artist

Ann Jonas Ann Jonas (January 28, 1932 – September 29, 2013) was a writer and illustrator of several picture books for children. Her books often used odd, abstract images to stretch children's imaginations. Biography Jonas lived in Long Island for ...

Career

Crews was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1963, and sent to

Frankfurt, Germany Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the foreland of the Taunus on its namesake Main, it forms a contin ...

. While in Germany, he designed a children's alphabet book to include in his portfolio. After multiple rejections, the book was published as ''We Read: A to Z'' by

Harper & Row Harper is an American publishing house, the flagship imprint of global publisher HarperCollins, based in New York City. Founded in New York in 1817 by James Harper and his brother John, the company operated as J. & J. Harper until 1833, when ...

(now

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is a British–American publishing company that is considered to be one of the "Big Five (publishers), Big Five" English-language publishers, along with Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group USA, Hachette, Macmi ...

) in 1967. Crews' second children's book, ''Ten Black Dots'', was published the following year. In addition to children's books, he continued working as a freelance graphic designer and illustrator. A recurring motif in Crews' work is transportation, seen in books ''Freight Train'' (1978), ''Truck'' (1980), ''Harbor'' (1982), ''School Bus'' (1984), and ''Flying'' (1986). ''Freight Train'' and ''Truck'' were both awarded Caldecott Honors. These works use minimal text, focusing primarily on visuals, and rarely feature people. On this style, Crews said:

''Freight Train'' was close to the time when I was doing most of my work as a designer, and abstraction and brevity and symbol were more important to me, were more significant to the way I did my work.

In the 1990s, Crews began to create more personal works. Autobiographical books '' Bigmama's'' (1991) and ''Shortcut'' (1992) reflect on childhood summers with his grandparents, "Bigmama" and "Bigpapa", in Florida. Crews said that ''Bigmama's'' originated "from telling the story to isnieces and nephews and discussing it with issiblings and isparents".

e young people wanted to know more about what it looked like– what we meant by an outhouse, and the barn and the big house. We had few photographs of that experience. And I thought of it 'Bigmama's''more in terms of a way of clarifying the stories that we told all the time.

An additional motivation for Crews' autobiographical stories is "the fact that there aren't very many books about Black families and their lives".

Personal life

Crews and Ann Jonas were married in Germany in 1963, and had two daughters. Their first daughter, Nina, was born in Germany, and their second daughter, Amy, was born in New York. Nina is also an award-winning children's book author.About Nina Crews. The couple lived in New York City until 1996, when they relocated to a restored farmhouse in the Hudson River Valley. Jonas died in September 2013.

Selected works

*''

Bicycle Race "Bicycle Race" is a song by the British rock band Queen. It was released on their 1978 album ''Jazz'' and written by Queen's lead singer Freddie Mercury. It was released as a double A-side single together with the song " Fat Bottomed Girls", re ...

'' (1985) *'' Bigmama's'' (1991) *''

Carousel A carousel or carrousel (mainly North American English), merry-go-round (International English), or galloper (British English) is a type of amusement ride consisting of a rotating circular platform with seats for riders. The seats are tradit ...

'' (1982) *'' Cloudy Day Sunny Day'' (1999) *''Flying'' (1986) * ''

'' (1978) –

Caldecott Honor Book The Randolph Caldecott Medal, frequently shortened to just the Caldecott, annually recognizes the preceding year's "most distinguished American picture book for children". It is awarded to the illustrator by the Association for Library Service ...

*'' Inside Freight Train'' (2001) *''

Harbor A harbor (American English), or harbour (Commonwealth English; see spelling differences), is a sheltered body of water where ships, boats, and barges can be moored. The term ''harbor'' is often used interchangeably with ''port'', which is ...

'' (1982) *''

Light Light, visible light, or visible radiation is electromagnetic radiation that can be visual perception, perceived by the human eye. Visible light spans the visible spectrum and is usually defined as having wavelengths in the range of 400– ...

'' (1981) *'' Night at the Fair'' (1998) *''

Parade A parade is a procession of people, usually organized along a street, often in costume, and often accompanied by marching bands, floats, or sometimes large balloons. Parades are held for a wide range of reasons, but are usually some variety ...

'' (1983) *'' Sail Away'' (1995) *''

School Bus A school bus is any type of bus owned, leased, contracted to, or operated by a school or school district. It is regularly used to Student transport, transport students to and from school or school-related activities, but not including a charter ...

'' (1984) *''

Shortcut Shortcut may refer to: Navigation * Rat running or shortcut, a minor-road alternative to a signposted route * File shortcut, a handle which allows the user to find a file or resource located in a different directory or folder on a computer * Key ...

'' (1992) *'' Ten Black Dots'' (1968) *''Truck'' (1980) – Caldecott Honor Book *''We Read: A to Z'' (1967) ;As illustrator only *'' Blue Sea'' (written by Robert Kalan) (1979) *''

Each Orange Had 8 Slices Each may refer to: *''each'', a determiner and indefinite pronoun in the English language *EACH, Educational Action Challenging Homophobia, a UK charitable organisation See also *Every (disambiguation) Every may refer to: People * Every (surname ...

'' (written by Paul Giganti, Jr.) (1992) *'' How Many Snails'' (written by Paul Giganti, Jr.) (1988) *'' More Than One'' (written by Miriam Schlein) (1996) *''

Rain Rain is a form of precipitation where water drop (liquid), droplets that have condensation, condensed from Water vapor#In Earth's atmosphere, atmospheric water vapor fall under gravity. Rain is a major component of the water cycle and is res ...

'' (written by Robert Kalan) (1978) *'' This Is the Sunflower'' (written by Lola M. Schaefer) (2000) *'' Tomorrow's Alphabet'' (written by George Shannon) (1996)

References

Donald Crews
entry at

website. *
Donald Crews: the signs and times of an American childhood
' by George Bodmer from the Spring 1998 issue of the

African American Review ''African American Review'' is a scholarly aggregation of essays on African-American literature, theatre, film, the visual arts, and culture; interviews; poetry; fiction; and book reviews. It is the official publication of the Modern Language Ass ...

. (accessed May 31, 2006)

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Crews, Donald 1938 births Living people Writers from Newark, New Jersey American children's book illustrators Children's Literature Legacy Award winners Caldecott Honor winners Writers who illustrated their own writing Cooper Union alumni African-American children's writers African-American illustrators 21st-century American illustrators 20th-century American illustrators African-American male writers United States Army personnel