Emily Arnold McCully

Background

Emily McCully was born on July 1, 1939, in Galesburg, Illinois, United States. She is the daughter of Wade E. and Kathryn (Maher) Arnold.

Education

Emily received a Bachelor of Arts from Brown University in 1961 and a Master of Arts from Columbia University in 1964.

Career

After graduation, Emily began freelancing in illustration, doing book covers and book review illustrations for the New York Herald Tribune. In 1966, a children's book editor saw some of her work in a subway advertisement and suggested McCully do the illustrations for Sea Reach Express by Greg Panetta. In this way she began a serendipitous career as a children’s book illustrator. In 1969, she illustrated Meindert de Jong’s Journey from Peppermint Street, the first children’s book to win the National Book Award.

Her first solo effort with a picture book was Picnic, the wordless story of a family of mice that loses one of their number en route to an al fresco outing. The winner of a Christopher Award in 1985, Picnic set McCully on a course to create her own books in addition to illustrating the works of others. Since then she wrote two novels and illustrated or wrote more than two hundred children's books.

As an actor, McCully performed in Equity productions of Elizabeth Diggs’ Saint Florence at Capital Rep in Albany and The Vineyard Theater in New York City.

Achievements

• Emily McCully is a distinguished illustrator and writer of children's books. Her best known works include Picnic, for which she received Christopher Award in 1985, and Mirette on the High Wire, for which she received Caldecott Medal in 1993.

Works

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  • The Escape of Oney Judge: Martha Washington’s Slave Finds Freedom

    (When General George Washington is elected the first Presi...)

    2007
  • Beautiful Warrior: The Legend of the Nun's Kung Fu

    (Mingyi, a desperate woman who does not want to marry the ...)

    1998
  • Popcorn at the Palace

    (Maisie Ferris and her parents are interested in new ideas...)

    1997
  • Picnic

    (When Picnic was first published in 1984, readers fell in ...)

    2003
  • Four Hungry Kittens

    (In a wordless story, four kittens share adventures and da...)

    2001
  • Caroline's Comets: A True Story

    (With courage and confidence, Caroline Herschel (1750-1848...)

    2017
  • Dreaming in Code: Ada Byron Lovelace, Computer Pioneer

    (This illuminating biography reveals how the daughter of L...)

    2019
  • Manjiro: The Boy Who Risked His Life for Two Countries

    (In 1841, Japan had been closed to the outside world for 2...)

    2008
  • She Did It!: 21 Women Who Changed the Way We Think

    (Prepare to discover new heroes among these twenty-one wom...)

    2018
  • Marvelous Mattie

    (With her sketchbook labeled My Inventions and her father'...)

    2006
  • Squirrel and John Muir

    (Floy Hutchings, also known as Squirrel, is the daughter o...)

    2004
  • The Secret Cave: Discovering Lascaux

    (Jacques, Jojo, Simon, and Marcel were looking for buried ...)

    2010
  • Mirette on the High Wire

    (One day, a mysterious stranger arrives at a boardinghouse...)

    1992
  • Wonder Horse: The True Story of the World's Smartest Horse

    (In the late 1800s, former slave and veterinarian Bill "Do...)

    2010
  • Pete Won't Eat

    (Everyone is mad at Pete! Even Mom! But Pete can't eat tha...)

    2013
  • The Ballot Box Battle

    (It is a tale of a young girl's act of bravery inspired by...)

    1996
  • Strongheart: The World's First Movie Star Dog

    (Strongheart may have been a movie star, but he wasn't alw...)

    2014
  • Ida M. Tarbell: The Woman Who Challenged Big Business-and Won!

    (Born in 1857 and raised in oil country, Ida M. Tarbell wa...)

    2014
  • Queen of the Diamond: The Lizzie Murphy Story

    (Lizzie Murphy was good at baseball. In fact, she was bett...)

    2015
  • Little Ducks Go 2014

Interests

• Theater, acting, gardening, cooking, travel

• Sport & Clubs

  Tennis

Connections

Emily married George E. McCully, a historian, on June 3, 1961. They divorced in 1975. They have two sons: Nathaniel and Thaddeus.

Father:

Wade E. Arnold

Mother:

Kathryn (Maher) Arnold

ex-spouse:

George E. McCully

Son:

Nathaniel McCully

Son:

Thaddeus McCully

References

• Contemporary Authors A Bio-Bibliographical Guide to Current Writers in Fiction, General Non-Fiction, Poetry, Journalism, Drama, Motion Pictures, Television, and Other Fields
  2008