Rachel Field
(1984–1942)

A prolific writer, Rachel Field produced dozens of volumes of stories, plays, and poetry before she died in 1942 at the age of 47. She also illustrated some of her own books and was the first woman to receive the prestigious Newbery Medal in 1930 for her children's novel Hitty: Her First Hundred Years.

Many of Field's stories and poems are set in the New England landscape of her childhood. Born in New York, she spent her adolescent years in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Her early school years were frustrating for her because she did not learn to read until she was about ten years old. However, she developed a love for writing.

Field's writing skills won her admission as a special student to Radcliffe College, a sister school of Harvard University. At Radcliffe, she studied under well-known playwright George Baker and wrote some of her most successful plays, including Three Pills in a Bottle; Rise Up, Jennie Smith; and Time Will Tell. For nearly five years after she left Radcliffe in 1918, though, one publisher after another rejected her work. Her critics noted in their rejection letters that her portrayal of children was her strongest asset and suggested she write children's books. Field took their advice and concentrated on children's literature, eventually publishing her first collection of juvenile verse, The Pointed People: Verses and Silhouettes (1924).

Between 1926 and 1930, Field published 15 books. In the latter years of her life, she also became well known for her adult fiction, winning the Booksellers Award for the most distinguished novel of 1935 for Time Out of Mind.

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