Robin McKown (January 27, 1907 — August 1975) was an American writer of young adult literature, chiefly biography and fiction. During and after World War II, she was chair of an organization that helped the widows and orphans of men who had died fighting for the French Resistance. She received the Josette Frank Award for Janine in 1960.[1] The following year she received the Child Study Association Award for the same book.[2]
Personal life and education
Robin McKown was born in Denver[2][3] or Boulder, Colorado.[4] During her childhood in Denver, she was known as Louise and Louisa Clason.[5][6] Her parents were Anna and George Samuel Clason,[2][5][6] author and cofounder of the Clason Map Company, who settled in Denver in 1900.[7] Her brother Clyde B. Clason was also an author.[7]
She worked in both sales promotion and radio scriptwriting and was the author of a column for the Book-of-the-Month Club.[8] She was also a literary agent.[2]
McKown wrote books for young adults, traveling throughout the United States and to the Congo, South Africa, Peru, Ireland, Italy, Madagasgar, and North Africa for research.[2]
Residency in France
During World War II, McKown volunteered with an organization that helped the widows and orphans of men who had died fighting for the French Resistance, spending six weeks in France following the Allied victory in 1945.[8] She was the chairman of the organization known at the Friends of Widows and Orphans of the French Resistance following the war.[8][9] Formally named The National Association of Families of the Shot and Massacred (Association Nationale des Familles de Fusillés et Massacrés), it was allied with the American Aid to France. The organization was headquartered in New York City, where McKown lived at the time.[10] Packages of food, clothing, toys and medicine were sent to more than 1,000 survivors.[9] Later, she returned to northeastern France and lived there for three years, an experience that inspired the settings for two of her novels, Janine and Patriot of the Underground.[8] After France, she returned to New York City.[11]
The Execution of Maximilian: A Hapsburg Emperor Meets Disaster in the New World (1973)
Mark Twain: Novelist, Humorist, Satirist, Grassroots Historian, and America's Unpaid Goodwill Ambassador at Large (1974)
The Opium War in China: 1840-1842 (1975)
The Resignation of Nixon: A Discredited President Gives Up the Nation's Highest Office (1975)
Fiction
Author's Agent (1957)
Publicity Girl (1958)
Foreign Service Girl (1960)
Patriot of the Underground (1964)
Rakoto and the Drongo Bird (1966)
Janine (1967)
The Boy Who Woke Up in Madagascar (1967)
Girl of Madagascar (1968)
Legacy
McKown's work was compared to that of Horatio Alger known for his contribution to young adult literature. She was noted for her book Giant of the Atom: Ernest Rutherford (1963) written in a "delightful humorous manner" that did not require a comprehensive background in physics to understand.[13]
References
^Hare, Peter. "Past Winners - 1960s". Bank Street College of Education. Retrieved 2022-07-31.
^ abSchmidt, Barbara (Fall 2016). "Memorial roster of Mark Twain scholars, 2016 update". Mark Twain Journal. 54 (2): 161–164.
^ ab"Louise Clason", Thirteenth Census of the United States, 1910 (NARA microfilm publication T624, 1,178 rolls). Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29., National Archives, Washington, D.C.
^ ab"Louisa Clason", Fourteenth Census of the United States, 1920. (NARA microfilm publication T625, 2076 rolls). Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29., National Archives, Washington, D.C.
^ ab"H.S. Clason". The Nebraska State Journal. 1938-12-25. p. 25. Retrieved 2022-07-31.
^ abcdeHelbig, Alethea K.; Perkins, Agnes Regan (1986). Dictionary of American children's fiction, 1960-1984 : recent books of recognized merit. New York: Greenwood Press. pp. 412–413. ISBN0313252335. OCLC898799156.
