Theodor Seuss Geisel

The real “Dr. Seuss” was not an official doctor, but his prescription for fun has delighted readers for more than 60 years. Born on March 2, 1904 in Springfield, Massachusetts, Theodor (“Ted”) Seuss Geisel was America's best-loved author of children's books. A doodler at heart, Dr. Seuss often remarked that he never really learned to draw. His school notebooks often included bizarre creatures that framed sporadic notes he had taken in class. Over the years, Dr. Seuss’s illustrations brought a visual realization to his fantastic and imaginary worlds. He personally created every rough sketch, preliminary drawing, final line drawing and finished work for each page of every project he illustrated.

Despite the technical and budgetary limitations of color printing during the early and mid-twentieth century, Dr. Seuss was meticulous about color selection. He created specially numbered color charts and elaborate color call-outs to precisely accomplish his vision for each book. Saturated reds and blues, for example, were carefully chosen for The Cat in the Hat to attract and maintain the visual attention of a six-year-old audience.

Presidential libraries have plenty of art, including numerous portraits of Presidents, but the LBJ Library & Museum has artwork you might not expect - a set of original drawings by Dr. Seuss. It's the artwork from The Lorax, which Dr. Seuss considered his finest work. The book, written in Dr. Seuss's trademark whimsical rhyme, tells the tale of a creature who "speaks for the trees." The Lorax wages a courageous battle against an evil creature called the Once-ler, who cuts down trees to make Thneeds, "which everyone needs."

Dr. Seuss found it difficult to write The Lorax and decided to take a trip to Africa. It was there that he found most of his inspiration for the characters and landscape in the book. The image that broke his writer’s block was a herd of elephants traveling across a mountain in the distance from the view he had sitting by the pool of his hotel. The Truffula trees are reminiscent of the trees of the Serengeti.

In a 1986 exhibition catalog, Dr. Seuss described in his own words how the artwork from The Lorax came to be in the LBJ Library:

“I don't have The Lorax here [at home]. It's in Texas, and you may wonder why. I was at a dinner for Democrats some years ago, and I sat next to Liz Carpenter, who was [Lady Bird's] press secretary. Since Lady Bird was so interested in beautification, it seemed that environmental protection was a safe topic, so I mentioned that I had written a book on the subject. Liz seemed interested, but soon after, she left the room. When she reappeared, she called me to the phone and said, ‘The President wants to talk to you.’ I said ‘Hello’ and there was LBJ thanking me for donating the drawings of The Lorax to his library in Austin, Texas.”

The gift consisted of two sets of art - preliminary crayon drawings and final pen-and-ink line art - which the NCCIL displayed on loan from the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum from June 9, 2012 through October 12, 2012.

Related Exhibitions: The Lorax; Theodor Geisel/Dr. Seuss (2012), curated by the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum