Jerome M. Beatty Jr. (December 9, 1916 – July 31, 2002) was a twentieth-century American author of

children's literature Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. Modern children's literature is classified in two different ways: genre or the intended age of the reader. Children's ...

. He was also an accomplished

feature writer A feature story is a piece of non-fiction writing about news. A feature story is a type of soft news. The main sub-types are the ''news feature'' and the ''human-interest story''. A feature story is distinguished from other types of non-news ...

for

magazines A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combina ...

. Beatty served in the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

, achieving the rank of

corporal Corporal is a military rank in use in some form by many militaries and by some police forces or other uniformed organizations. The word is derived from the medieval Italian phrase ("head of a body"). The rank is usually the lowest ranking non- ...

, and is buried at the Massachusetts National Cemetery.

Popular books

Arguably, Beatty's most popular works are the Matthew and Maria Looney books, a

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imagination, imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, Paral ...

series for children. Matthew and Maria Looney are a brother and sister who live on the

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width ...

, part of an alien civilization of people who, as it turns out, are a lot like us Earthlings. The series was first published in the early 1960s, at the dawn of the

Space Age The Space Age is a period encompassing the activities related to the Space Race, space exploration, space technology, and the cultural developments influenced by these events, beginning with the launch of Sputnik 1 during 1957, and continuing ...

, and is clearly influenced by that era.

Selected works

Books

* ''Matthew Looney's Voyage to the Earth'' (1961) * ''Matthew Looney's Invasion of the Earth'' (1965) * ''Matthew Looney in the

Outback The Outback is a remote, vast, sparsely populated area of Australia. The Outback is more remote than the bush. While often envisaged as being arid, the Outback regions extend from the northern to southern Australian coastlines and encompass a ...

'' (1969) * ''Matthew Looney and the Space Pirates'' (1972) * ''Maria Looney on the Red Planet'' (1977) * ''Maria Looney and the Cosmic Circus'' (1978) * ''Maria Looney and the Remarkable

Robot A robot is a machine—especially one programmable by a computer—capable of carrying out a complex series of actions automatically. A robot can be guided by an external control device, or the control may be embedded within. Robots may be ...

'' (1978) * ''Bob Fulton's Amazing Soda-Pop Stretcher: An International Spy Story'' (1963) * ''Bob Fulton's Terrific Time Machine: An Adventure in Space and Time'' (1963) * ''Sex Rears Its Lovely Head: Cartoons edited from family magazines'' Bantam Books (1956) * ''Show Me The Way To Go Home'' (1959) * ''The Girls We Leave Behind'' (1963) * ''1 O'Clock in the Button Factory'' (1964) * ''Double Take'' (1971) * ''The Tunnel to Yesterday'' * ''Sheriff Stonehead and the Teen-Age Termites'' (1970) * ''From New Bedford to Siberia : A Yankee Whaleman in the Frozen North'' (1977)

Periodicals

* "Sweetheart of the A.E.F.", feature story on

Rita Hayworth Rita Hayworth (born Margarita Carmen Cansino; October 17, 1918May 14, 1987) was an American actress, dancer and producer. She achieved fame during the 1940s as one of the era's top stars, appearing in 61 films over 37 years. The press coined th ...

, ''

The American Magazine ''The American Magazine'' was a periodical publication founded in June 1906, a continuation of failed publications purchased a few years earlier from publishing mogul Miriam Leslie. It succeeded '' Frank Leslie's Popular Monthly'' (1876–1904) ...

'', December 1942 * "Collier’s Credits", '' Colliers'' Sep 17 1954, Jul 22 1955, Aug 19 1955 * "The Shuddering Truth About Pipe Smokers", '' Pageant'' Dec 1956 * "White House Pipeline", ''

Cavalier The term Cavalier () was first used by Roundheads as a term of abuse for the wealthier royalist supporters of King Charles I and his son Charles II of England during the English Civil War, the Interregnum, and the Restoration (1642 – ). It ...

'' Feb 1962 * "Yes, Virginia, There Is a South Pole Santa Claus", '' Colliers'' Dec 23 1955 * "Hanging Up On Hemingway", The night Ernest talked on—no one knows how long, squire MagazineFeb 1967 * ''Have You Ever Wondered?'' Macfadden Books (1962)

References

* Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2009. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center.
US ARMY Names in the Massachusetts National Cemetery

External links

* * , if all his; primarily as 'Beatty, Jerome' on the previous page of the browse report 1916 births 2002 deaths American children's writers United States Army personnel of World War II United States Army non-commissioned officers Loomis Chaffee School alumni {{US-child-writer-stub