Things to Make and Do (1965)

When I was a child much of my entertainment was book and paper based.  Puzzles and games books were very popular and this one was my favourite - it gave me endless enjoyment.

I desperately wanted this toy theatre but was still too young to be able to make it with any dexterity.  I also wanted it to look exactly like this illustration but did not yet have the skill to replicate the pictures accurately and any concept of copying an illustration was the stuff of science fiction.

Although my parents gave me a wonderful array of toys and books to play with, the general idea at the time was that as children we would then entertain ourselves.  My parents had busy and active lives and we would never have thought to ask them to make something for us like this in the same way that I would spend hours constructing something for my son if he expressed any interest.  

There were a number of staples in these books.

Pages to decipher with pictures and numbers . . .
  

A maze was an absolute must (and there would have been more than one in the book) . . .

A page full of different types of puzzles . . .  

There were always pages where you had to spot the deliberate mistakes . . .

Pages where you had to find things . . .

And game ideas that could be taken outside . . .

Of course there were always pages of pictures to colour . . .

I think I was quite avant garde with this one, turning it into a sunset scene instead of the traditional sunny day!

All of these scans come from 'The Jack and Jill Book of Games and Puzzles', printed in 1965, described inside as 'the merriest book of the year!'

   

Here Be Dragons

I've noticed this picture on a couple of sites that sell posters and prints as well as in the picture library of Look and Learn.  It is another example of Embleton's work and is always titled 'Boy and Girl on Lake'.

Ron Embleton - The Last Dragons

I often wonder if anyone who sees it is curious to know what the children are looking at as the dragonflies are not included in the stand-alone version of the scene.

This illustration is from a story called 'The Last Dragons' that appeared in the 1963 Jack and Jill annual.  It is about two very unhappy dragons who become the first dragonflies.  The story even recounts that the dragonflies decide to marry so the new species will continue.  
    

As a child I was intrigued by the depiction of the fairies in this story.  They are very grown up - more sirens than simple fairies with a refined glamour reminiscent of the golden age of movie stars.  In some ways they are an early precursor of the adult illustration work Embleton did towards the end of his career.

I've included a detail of one of the fairies from this story, followed by a panel from the story I posted in my first blog entry, The Golden Ball.  Although separated by a couple of years the depiction of the fairies in both is very similar.      

Ron Embleton - The Golden Ball

More dragons can be found in Delightful Dragons posted 12 August.

The Green in Winter

Last time I included photos of the swans in St Stephen's Green taken last summer.  Just before Christmas the park was covered in snow.  The next photo shows the same lake frozen over.  The swans were left with a tiny place to swim, sheltered by a bridge.  

Another photograph of the park in winter.

Childhood Memories

I grew up in Africa in the 1960's.  The books that shaped my childhood came from England.  The paper dolls I loved to play with were published largely in America.  My childhood was therefore a glorious amalgamation of all three continents.

I've recently discovered a number of blogs celebrating the wonderful children's illustrators of that period.  They have brought me so much enjoyment I've decided to add some memories of my own.  I'm new to doing this so forgive me if my initial attempts are a bit clumsy.  What I'm trying to contribute are some of my favourite stories, paper dolls and illustrations that are not so easily found anywhere else.

This is the first story I can remember that opened up a world of magic and enchantment, filling me with a sense of wonder which remained constant throughout my childhood.  It appeared in the 1965 Jack and Jill Christmas Annual and was called the Golden Ball:

 

Ron Embleton - The Golden Ball

The artist was the brilliant childrens' illustrator, Ron Embleton (1930-1988.)  It was only many years later as an adult that I realised he was the connecting link between many of the images that shaped my childhood and to which I return even today with admiration and awe.

Paper dolls are such a simple concept, but the imagination and skill of the artists who produced them have left a legacy that appears undiminished with time.  I've started collecting some of those I remember from long ago.  This Saalfield "Dolls from Storyland" by Hilda Miloche was one of my all time favourites:

I've included the first three pages now, I'll add the rest next time.

Ireland has been my home for the past 10 years.  With all the snow we had before Christmas it was like living in a fairy tale of our own.  This is the view from my office which is behind Dublin Castle.  Sometimes it felt like working at Hogwarts.