Herbert Spencer Zim (July 12, 1909 – December 5, 1994) was a
naturalist, author, editor and educator best known as the founder (1945) and
editor-in-chief
An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies.
The highest-ranking editor of a publication may also be titled editor, managing ...
of the
Golden Guide
The Golden Guides, originally Golden Nature Guides, were a series of 160-page, pocket-sized books created by Western Publishing and published under their "Golden Press" line (primarily a children's book imprint) from 1949. Edited by Herbert S. Zim ...
s series of nature books.
Biography
Zim was born 1909 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 ...
, but spent his childhood years in southern
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
. At the age of fourteen he returned to the east. He took his degrees (B.S. biologia, M.S. biologia, Ph.D. botanica) at
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
.
Zim wrote or edited more than one hundred books on science, and in a thirty-year career teaching in the
public schools introduced laboratory instruction into elementary school science. He is best known as the founder in 1945 (and, for twenty-five years, editor in chief) of the
Golden Guide
The Golden Guides, originally Golden Nature Guides, were a series of 160-page, pocket-sized books created by Western Publishing and published under their "Golden Press" line (primarily a children's book imprint) from 1949. Edited by Herbert S. Zim ...
s, pocket-size introductions for children to such subjects as
fossils
A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved in ...
,
zoology
Zoology ()The pronunciation of zoology as is usually regarded as nonstandard, though it is not uncommon. is the branch of biology that studies the Animal, animal kingdom, including the anatomy, structure, embryology, evolution, Biological clas ...
,
microscopy
Microscopy is the technical field of using microscopes to view objects and areas of objects that cannot be seen with the naked eye (objects that are not within the resolution range of the normal eye). There are three well-known branches of micr ...
,
rocks
In geology, rock (or stone) is any naturally occurring solid mass or aggregate of minerals or mineraloid matter. It is categorized by the minerals included, its chemical composition, and the way in which it is formed. Rocks form the Earth's ...
and
minerals
In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid chemical compound with a fairly well-defined chemical composition and a specific crystal structure that occurs naturally in pure form.John P. Rafferty, ed. (2 ...
,
trees
In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, including only woody plants with secondary growth, plants that are u ...
,
wildflowers,
dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...
s,
navigation
Navigation is a field of study that focuses on the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another.Bowditch, 2003:799. The field of navigation includes four general categories: land navigation, ...
and more. He was the sole or co-author for many of the books, which were valued for their clarity, accuracy and attractive presentation—helped by the illustrations of
James Gordon Irving
James Gordon Irving (June 2, 1913 – August 15, 2012) was a commercial illustrator and painter, best known for illustrating the early Golden Guide series of nature books.
Life and career
Irving, who went by the name Gordon, was born in Ridge ...
and Zim's friend
Raymond Perlman.
He moved to
Florida
Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...
with his wife, the anthropologist
Sonia (Sonnie) Bleeker, and continued to work on the Golden Guides series until
Alzheimer's disease
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegeneration, neurodegenerative disease that usually starts slowly and progressively worsens. It is the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in short-term me ...
forced him to slow down in the 1990s. He died in 1994 at
Plantation Key
Plantation Key is an island in Monroe County, Florida, United States. It is located in the upper Florida Keys on U.S. 1 (or the Overseas Highway), between Key Largo and Windley Key.
All of the key is within the Village of Islamorada as of Nove ...
, survived by his second wife, Grace Showe, and two sons.
See also
*The Legend of
Wan Hu
Wan Hu (万户 or 万虎) is a legendary Chinese official – supposedly having lived from as early as 2000 BCE to as late as the middle Ming dynasty (16th century) who was described in 20th century sources as the world's first "astronaut" by h ...
*
Golden Field Guide
The Golden Field Guides are a series of larger pocket-sized books that were created by Western Publishing and published under their "Golden Press" line (mostly used for children's books at the time), as a related series to the Golden Guides. Edit ...
References
External links
The Herbert S. Zim papers at the de Grummond Children's Literature Collection, The University of Southern MississippiGuide to the Herbert Zim papers at the University of Oregon.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zim, Herbert
1909 births
1994 deaths
20th-century American educators
American science writers
American print editors
Columbia College (New York) alumni
Recreational cryptographers
20th-century American non-fiction writers
Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni