Dorothy Kunhardt (née Dorothy Meserve; September 29, 1901 – December 23, 1979) was an American children's-book author, best known for the baby book ''

Pat the Bunny ''Pat the Bunny'' is the first "touch and feel" interactive children's book, written and illustrated by Dorothy Kunhardt. Since its publication in 1940, it has been a perennial best-seller in the United States. Rather than follow a linear narra ...

.'' She was also a historian and writer about the life of U.S. President

Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...

Works

Kunhardt wrote nearly 50 books, including one of the bestselling children's books in history, ''

,'' which has sold over six million copies. She initially wrote it for her youngest child Edith Kunhardt Davis. Other works include ''Twenty Days,'' an account of

Lincoln's assassination On April 14, 1865, Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the United States, was assassinated by well-known stage actor John Wilkes Booth, while attending the play ''Our American Cousin'' at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. Shot in the head ...

and the twenty days that followed, which she wrote with her son, Philip B. Kunhardt, Jr.; ''Tiny Animal Stories''; ''The Telephone Book''; ''Lucky Mrs. Ticklefeather''; ''Brave Mr. Buckingham''; ''Junket is Nice'' (1933); ''Wise Old Aard-Vark'' (1936); and ''Now Open the Box''.

Personal life

A daughter of historian

Frederick Hill Meserve Frederick Hill Meserve (1865 – 1962) was a businessman and collector of photographs. He published a large collection of early American photographic portraits. In 1944 he worked with historian Carl Sandburg to publish 100 photographs of Abraham Li ...

, she was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

and graduated from

Bryn Mawr College Bryn Mawr College ( ; Welsh: ) is a women's liberal arts college in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Founded as a Quaker institution in 1885, Bryn Mawr is one of the Seven Sister colleges, a group of elite, historically women's colleges in the United St ...

in 1923. She married Philip B. Kunhardt, Sr. (son of George E. Kunhardt), a New Yorker and a

Harvard Crimson football The Harvard Crimson football program represents Harvard University in college football at the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (formerly Division I-AA). Harvard's football program is one of the oldest in the world, having begun c ...

letterwinner. Their home in

Morristown, New Jersey Morristown () is a town and the county seat of Morris County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. ...

housed a collection of items related to the American Civil War and Abraham Lincoln. They had four children: *Nancy Kunhardt Lodge (1927–1997), who was married to

Harvard Business School Harvard Business School (HBS) is the graduate business school of Harvard University, a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. It is consistently ranked among the top business schools in the world and offers a large full-time MBA p ...

professor emeritus George Cabot Lodge II *Philip Bradish Kunhardt, Jr. (1928–2006), former reporter and managing director of ''

Life Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energ ...

'' magazine and producer of documentaries such as

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

’s ''The American President''; married to the former Katharine Trowbridge and had 6 children, including documentary filmmaker Peter Kunhardt, whose son is Peter W. Kunhardt, Jr. *Kenneth Bradish Kunhardt (1930–1995), stockbroker; married to the former Edith L. Woodruff of New York City, former schoolteacher, 4 children. Woodruff is related to the

Coolidge family The following is an alphabetical list of political families in the United States whose last name begins with C. The Cabaniss and McRaes * Thomas Banks Cabaniss (1835–1915), Georgia State Representative 1865–67, Solicitor General in Georg ...

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

through her mother. *Edith Kunhardt Davis (1937–2020) children's author and illustrator

Selected works

Now Open the Box (1934)
Junket is Nice (1935)
''

'' (1940)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kunhardt, Dorothy 1901 births 1979 deaths American children's writers Historians of Abraham Lincoln Bryn Mawr College alumni People from Morristown, New Jersey Writers from New Jersey Writers from New York City American women historians 20th-century American historians 20th-century American women writers Historians from New York (state) American women children's writers