Stan Berenstain

Stan Berenstain

Written by: Tim Godfrey, Fall 2001; revised 2005; updated 2015
Awards
The School Bell Awards, Best Book Award from the American Institute of Graphic Arts, The University of Chicago Best Book Award
9/29/1923 - 11/26/2005
Vocation
Literary
Geographic Connection to Pennsylvania: Solebury, Bucks County
Abstract

Award-winning children's book author of The Berenstain Bears series Stan Berenstain was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1923 and attended The Philadelphia College of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Read more here.

About the Berenstains. The Berenstain Bears website. 2018. 5 November 2018.

Biography

Stanley (Stan) Berenstain was born on September 29, 1923, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. His parents were Harry and Rose Berenstain. In 1946, he married JanGrant, an author and illustrator, with whom he had two sons, Leo and Michael.

Berenstain attended The Philadelphia College of Art from 1941 to 1942, where he met Janice Grant, his future wife. In 1946, he attended the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Stan and Jan Berenstain began their collaborative career drawing cartoons for magazines. The Berenstains were also co-creators of "It's All in the Family," an illustrated feature first published by McCall's magazine. In 1962, Berenstain and his wife published their first children's book The Big Honey Hunt.

Together, the Berenstains created The Berenstain Bears children's book series. They started writing these books to help their own children learn how to read, but the books quickly became favorites of young children learning how to read everywhere. Currently The Berenstain Bears series has more than 150 books in publication. The series also led to a series of animated television specials including The Berenstain Bears' Christmas Tree. In 1995 the Berenstain's released The Berenstain Bears Scouts Book Series, which currently has nine titles to its credit.

Stan Berenstain and his wife have received numerous awards for their work on The Berenstain Bears series. They have received multiple Philadelphia Library Children's Reading Round Table honor book awards. They have also received a Silver Diploma in 1980, 1982, and 1987 for The Berenstain Bears' Christmas Tree television special. They have received The School Bell Awards from the National Education Association, The Best Book Award from the American Institute of Graphic Arts, and The University of Chicago Best Book Award, among many other awards that are too numerous to count.

In article for the Philadelphia Inquirer, Gayle Simms noted this:

In 2002, after many more Berenstain Bears books, Stan and Jan wrote a joint autobiography, Down a Sunny Dirt Road. In it, he responded to the question of why they hadn't retired: "Why would we retire? We thrive on what we do. We travel extensively. We go to a lovely, salubrious place where honeybees hum, where rainbow trout match rainbow skies, where the rivers run clean and the air is sweet, where there's beauty around every bend in the sunny dirt road. It's a wonderful place. It's called Bear Country. We go there every day."

Stan Berenstain died of cancer on November 26, 2005, in a Doylestown hospital. He was survived by Jan, four children, and legions of fans whose childhoods he had enriched.

Selected Works
  • The Berenstain's Baby Book. New York: Macmillan, 1951.
  • Inside, Outside, Upside Down. New York: Random House, 1968.
  • Bears in the Night. New York: Random House, 1971.
  • He Bear, She Bear. New York: Random House, 1974.
  • The Berenstain Bears and the Missing Dinosaur Bone. New York: Random House, 1980.
  • The Berenstain Bears' Christmas Tree. New York: Random House, 1980.
  • The Berenstain Bears Visit the Dentist. New York: Random House, 1981.
  • The Berenstain Bears and Too Much TV. New York: Random House, 1984.
  • The Berenstain Bears Learn about Strangers. New York: Random House, 1985.
Sources
  • "Jan and Stan Berenstain." Authors Online Biography. 2001. 17 October 2001. <http://teacher.scholastic.com/authorsandbooks/authors/beren/bio.htm>.
  • Sims, Gayle Ronan. "Father of Berenstain Bears dies - Stanley Berenstain rivaled Dr. Seuss for children's affections." Philadelphia Inquirer. 30 Nov. 2005: A1.
  • "Stanley Berenstain." The Gale Literary Database: Contemporary Authors Online. 2006. 26 Sept. 2011.

Photo Credit: "Photograph of Stan Berenstain." Photograph. Cropped to 4x3. Source: Online Resource.