Rachel Field

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Rachel Field (September 19, 1894 – March 15, 1942) was an American writer who published novels, poetry, and children’s books. She grew up in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and published her first essay at age 16. She studied writing at Radcliffe College.

Her best-known book is Hitty, Her First Hundred Years, which won the Newbery Award in 1930. She also wrote Time Out of Mind (1935), All This and Heaven Too (1938), and And Now Tomorrow (1942). Field wrote for adults as well and collaborated with her husband, Arthur S. Pederson, on To See Ourselves (1937). She moved to Hollywood, lived with her husband and daughter, and wrote the English lyrics for the Ave Maria used in Disney’s Fantasia (1940). One of her plays was adapted into the British film The Londonderry Air (1938).

Field received several major recognitions. Time Out of Mind won a National Book Award in 1935. Prayer for a Child, published posthumously in 1944 with illustrations by Elizabeth Orton Jones, won the Caldecott Medal for the year’s best picture book, and Hitty and Prayer for a Child were added to the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award list. She died in Los Angeles in 1942 after surgery, at age 47. She is remembered as a versatile and beloved writer for both children and adults.