The Amateur Circus at Nutley by Peter Newall 1894

Peter Sheaf Hersey Newell (March 5, 1862 – January 15, 1924) was an American artist and writer. He created picture books and illustrated new editions of many children's books. A native of

McDonough County, Illinois McDonough County is a County (United States), county in the U.S. state of Illinois. According to the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it had a population of 27,238. Its county seat is Macomb, Illinois, Macomb, which is also the home of W ...

, Newell built a reputation in the 1880s and 1890s for his humorous drawings and poems, which appeared in ''

Harper's Weekly ''Harper's Weekly, A Journal of Civilization'' was an American political magazine based in New York City. Published by Harper (publisher), Harper & Brothers from 1857 until 1916, it featured foreign and domestic news, fiction, essays on many su ...

'', ''

Harper's Bazaar ''Harper's Bazaar'' (stylized as ''Harper's BAZAAR'') is an American monthly women's fashion magazine. Bazaar has been published in New York City since November 2, 1867, originally as a weekly publication entitled ''Harper's Bazar''."Corporat ...

'', ''

Scribner's Magazine ''Scribner's Magazine'' was an American periodical published by the publishing house of Charles Scribner's Sons from January 1887 to May 1939. ''Scribner's Magazine'' was the second magazine out of the Scribner's firm, after the publication of ...

'', ''

The Saturday Evening Post ''The Saturday Evening Post'' is an American magazine published six times a year. It was published weekly from 1897 until 1963, and then every other week until 1969. From the 1920s to the 1960s, it was one of the most widely circulated and influ ...

'', ''

Judge A judge is a person who wiktionary:preside, presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a judicial panel. In an adversarial system, the judge hears all the witnesses and any other Evidence (law), evidence presented by the barris ...

'', and other publications. He later wrote and illustrated several popular children's books, such as ''Topsys and Turvys'' (1893), a collection of poems and images which could be viewed upside-down or right-side-up; ''The Hole Book'' (1908), which had a literal hole at the center of each page to indicate the path of a bullet; and ''The Slant Book'' (1910), which took the shape of a

rhomboid Traditionally, in two-dimensional geometry, a rhomboid is a parallelogram in which adjacent sides are of unequal lengths and angles are non-right angled. The terms "rhomboid" and "parallelogram" are often erroneously conflated with each oth ...

and told the story of a baby carriage careening down a hill.Dennis Wepman "Newell, Peter" ''American National Biography Online''. February 2000. Retrieved on July 6, 2009. Newell often illustrated the works of other authors, such as

Mark Twain Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced," with William Fau ...

Stephen Crane Stephen Crane (November 1, 1871 – June 5, 1900) was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer. Prolific throughout his short life, he wrote notable works in the Realist tradition as well as early examples of American Naturalism an ...

John Kendrick Bangs John Kendrick Bangs (May 27, 1862 – January 21, 1922) was an American writer, humorist, editor and satirist. Biography He was born in Yonkers, New York. His father Francis N. Bangs was a lawyer in New York City, as was his brother, Francis S ...

, and

Lewis Carroll Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet, mathematician, photographer and reluctant Anglicanism, Anglican deacon. His most notable works are ''Alice ...

. He also created a comic strip serial, ''The Naps of Polly Sleepyhead'', which debuted in the ''

New York Herald The ''New York Herald'' was a large-distribution newspaper based in New York City that existed between 1835 and 1924. At that point it was acquired by its smaller rival the '' New-York Tribune'' to form the '' New York Herald Tribune''. Hi ...

'' in 1905. He died in Little Neck, New York in 1924. Newell's great-granddaughter, Laura Lydecker, was also an artist and children's book illustrator. Lydecker illustrated editions of Wind in the Willows and The Country Mouse and the City Mouse.

References

External links

* * *
Peter Newell's Books
at nonsenselit.org
''The Rocket Book''
From the Collections at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

* * Peter Newell Family Papers. Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. * Peter Newell Collection. Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. 1862 births 1924 deaths American magazine cartoonists American humorists American children's writers People from McDonough County, Illinois American children's book illustrators American humorous poets 19th-century American poets 20th-century American poets {{US-comics-creator-stub