Julie K. Rubini (00:00):
Just their day-to-day as writers and checking in with each other, and reading to each other, and sharing with each other. I fell in love with both of them. I just loved their love, and I love their love story.
Laura Maylene Walter (00:19):
Welcome to Page Count, presented by the Ohio Center for the Book at Cleveland Public Library. This podcast celebrates authors, illustrators, librarians, booksellers, literary advocates, and readers in and from the state of Ohio. I'm your host, Laura Maylene Walter, the Ohio Center for the Book Fellow and author of the novel, BODY OF STARS. Today, we're going to celebrate one of the most honored American children's book authors of all time, Virginia Hamilton. Julie K. Rubini is here to discuss her biography for young readers, VIRGINIA HAMILTON, AMERICA'S STORYTELLER, which will represent Ohio at the 2025 National Book Festival as the state's Great Reads from Great Places, Youth Selection. Julie, welcome to the podcast, and thank you so much for being here.
Julie K. Rubini (01:10):
And thank you so much for having me.
Laura Maylene Walter (01:12):
We have a lot to cover today, but I thought the best place to start would be Virginia Hamilton herself, because your book is such a beautiful tribute to her and covers so much ground regarding her life and work. It's really, really quite amazing. So, I think a lot of our listeners surely know just how great of an impact Virginia Hamilton has made on children's literature. And I could rattle off a lot of the awards she has won -- everything from the Newbury Medal, the National Book Award, the Coretta Scott King Award, the Hans Christian Andersen Medal, the MacArthur Fellowship Genius Grant, and on and on and on. But let's get a sense of how Virginia Hamilton was able to become such a beloved author. Can you start by telling us about her origins, how she grew up in Yellow Springs, Ohio? What was her young life like?
Julie K. Rubini (02:04):
That's an absolutely perfect place to start. She grew up among storytellers. Yeah, a great influencer in her life was her grandfather, Levi Perry, who was rescued from slavery by his mother, Mary Cloud. They escaped Virginia and made their way to family who had settled in Jamestown, Ohio. She was surrounded by, I say much like the fireflies that were on the farm there near Yellow Springs, that the stories just flooded and floated through her consciousness as a young child, as a little girl. And every year, her Grandfather Levi would share that story. He gathered the family around about how he was spared from a life of slavery because of the bravery of his mother, Mary Cloud. And there's a little mystery to that, because nobody really knows what happened to Mary Cloud, that she brought Levi up through Virginia, across the Ohio River, to this little town of Jamestown outside of Yellow Springs. And then, there's no reported history of what happened to Mary Cloud. Levi was raised and he had children, including Virginia's mother, Etta Belle, and he'd sit these children, his ten children, around and tell them that story about how he was so fortunate. And they consequently were all fortunate, because they were not to be experiencing this life of slavery as his mother did, and how important it was to him for them to know that, to appreciate what their lives could have looked like otherwise. And she listened, and she was in awe. She wrote about holding her grandfather's hand, which was damaged from an accident in a factory that he worked in. And she so loved her grandfather -- there was one comment about how he could jump up in the air and click his heels three times before he came back down to the ground. And she could ever, never have seen that. And how she had these aunts and great aunts who would tell these stories of the War of the Worlds -- Orson Wells, the War of the Worlds radio program, which terrified the country at the time -- and how the response from both sides of the family -- how one aunt was so frightened that she ran out into the farm, and she started shooting up in the air at anything that moved, and the other side sequestered themselves down in the basement. So, just these stories and gossip. And Virginia, she admitted that she didn't really have that gift of sharing those stories verbally, but she had this gift of reporting them. And when she was, gosh -- eight, nine, ten years old, she had what she called "the Notebook," and she reported these stories, and she's just like that little fly on the wall and reporting all of these stories...
Laura Maylene Walter (05:04):
Like secrets, right. Family secrets. I bet it was so juicy.
Julie K. Rubini (05:10):
. You know, there was a description of her sitting up on the hog barn, the metal roof. And I can imagine how hot it might be in the summertime, but she's just listening and observing and recording. And then she lost the Notebook. And Arnold, when I first met with him -- we could have a whole conversation about my relationship, friendship with Arnold -- such a wonderful human being. He shared that she lamented that loss for the entirety of the rest of her life, that whatever was in there was lost. So, maybe it might have encouraged her to continue to record her thoughts and notes, and to hold onto those and not to lose them, based on this early experience of loss. And then the library was very instrumental as the family segued into Yellow Springs. Her father worked at the Antioch Tea Room, making his way up to the manager of the Tea Room, which offered her great exposure to students from all across the country, and even the world, at Antioch. So, it gave her a very early worldly view. And her mother, who raised the children and raised hens. They had special hens that made a variety of colors of eggs, and Virginia was very curious about them. So, her mother encouraged her to go to the library to learn more about these hens and these eggs, and Virginia loved at first sight. She learned later that her mother was wise, that by sending Virginia to the library, Virginia would learn. She would learn, and not only about those chickens and those eggs, but she would just immerse herself in stories and books, and learn about African folk tales, and learn about history, and learn about characters, and all of these books that fueled her imagination.
Laura Maylene Walter (06:56):
Yeah. So, from a young age, she knew she wanted to be a writer. You have a quote that, I'm not sure how old she was, but she told her sister that she was going to grow up to be a famous author, which, guess what. It happened, Virginia.
Julie K. Rubini (07:08):
Her sister said, "Well, fine. Then I'm going to be famous too," you know?
Laura Maylene Walter (07:11):
Yeah, I know. I love that. . So she grows up in Yellow Springs. She ends up going to Antioch when a community member advocates for her to get a scholarship. But in these years, maybe her teenage years, what was it like for Black families, or a Black girl growing up in Yellow Springs during this time?
Julie K. Rubini (07:31):
Very inclusive community. Virginia had extended family. She had cousins who lived there. The sense I received from Arnold was that it was very much an inclusive, outside of -- I tell the story of how, when she was a little girl, they would go to the little theater, where it was sectioned off with the Whites being able to sit in the front, and Blacks in the back, that soon after -- I mean, she was maybe eight or nine -- where the community rose to that and said, "You know, this is not right." And Antioch College students actually staged a protest where, initially, the White students sat in the front and the Blacks in the back, and then they all began switching seats. And management was so perplexed. Somebody got wind of it, and ultimately, they eliminated the barriers, and anyone could sit wherever they wanted to. And I sensed that there was not discrimination, based on these timeframes, the 50's, primarily in her teen years, that much of the country was experiencing at the time, because of how special Yellow Springs is, and how inclusive. And that, I think, really helped serve this foundation for Virginia, where she felt very accepted, and she didn't feel limited in anything that she wished to do or accomplish. And that was fueled by her, of course, her family, and the support of the family, her professors at Antioch -- yes, she did obtain, ultimately, a scholarship to go to Antioch. Interesting -- she never graduated from Antioch. She had a professor at Antioch who suggested that she should go to the Ohio State University and learn under her professor there. And that professor encouraged her to go to New York City, because back in the fifties, if you wanted to become published, that's what you did. So, here's Virginia Hamilton, the most honored author of children's literature ever, without having outside of an honorary degree. She did not have an actual degree. She didn't need it. As her professor said, "You're well on your way. Just go to New York." And that she did. And this becomes part of my favorite part of her story, and that was, when she's living in this very small apartment, she has a bathtub. She puts a board over top of the bathtub to serve as her desk. We had typewriters back then, and she was working multiple jobs, along with attempting to become this famous author. And she was doing singing gigs. She was working as a secretary. I mean, she was very tenacious and resilient and doing all that she could to make this happen. And meanwhile, several things were happening -- one of which was that one of her classmates at Antioch was a woman named Janet Schulman, who told her that one of her stories, that one of her essays that she wrote while she was at Antioch, she envisioned as a children's story. And Janet worked for a publisher, and so, she really encouraged Virginia to move forward with that story in the realm of a children's book. And that ultimately became ZEELY, which was her very first published work.
Laura Maylene Walter (10:40):
It really shows how important it is for aspiring or growing writers to have support in all forms. You know, if she hadn't had someone advocate for her to get the scholarship to Antioch, she wouldn't have ended up there. Or at OSU, where she was encouraged to go to New York, and then, the friend remembering her story and saying, "This could be a children's --" It's really amazing that she did it all herself, of course, and I love that image of her in the tub with the board across the tub -- but to have this support at such key moments. And I was really intrigued by the fact that she, originally, in New York, was trying to write a book for adults. It was titled MAYO, and the editor couldn't believe that, basically, a Black woman could write from the point of view of a male protagonist. And that book, for the time being, didn't really go anywhere. Can you tell us a bit more about that, and the impact that had on her future writing career?
Julie K. Rubini (11:37):
Absolutely. And I think once ZEELY was published, and she said she really didn't know from the outset, she didn't really know anything about writing children's books, but she took it on very quickly and very well. And after the success of ZEELY, probably, although I didn't find this out for a fact, but given the role that Janet was serving -- and then, having been introduced to other editors, I'm sure, as it works now, that one gets published and then they want to know, "Well, what other works do you have?" Perhaps, what's in those file folders, if you will. And here, she has this adult novel, and likely encouraged that based on the success of ZEELY, that she should consider creating this story for children as well. And she told her editor, Susan Hirschman, that she kept having this vision of this boy with lettuce leaves wrapped around his wrist, and it was such a vivid image for her. And she's sitting down with Susan Hirschman in her office in New York City, and Susan said, "Well, you just need to follow a story. You know, find a story." And the next thing you know, he's M.C. Higgins, the Great. He loves to perch atop a forty-foot pole and look down and over Sarah's Mountain, which was supposed to be his mountain. And it comes to be that we understand that strip mining is occurring at Sarah's Mountain, and it's tearing his world literally apart. And then, he has the friendship with Ben, and I'm forgetting this character's last name, but a Black character, M.C. Higgins, and a White character and befriending -- and you know, they live out in the country - just quintessential stories of kids living in the country. I was raised in the country, so I could identify with Virginia's stories of being out in the country, or in the case of ZEELY, where the brother and the sister, they go to their uncle's, and they meet this woman who resembles a Tutsi queen. And just the setting, the imaginations, the experiences, quite honestly, took me quite back to my childhood, sitting with Arnold -- White, Jewish man from the Bronx. There's a story in itself. We'll get to that in a second. But he said, "If it weren't for the cover, the book covers of her stories, you wouldn't know whether her characters were White or Black." You know, that they had these rural experiences as children that I had, growing up in the '60's and the '70's. What a wonderful, treasured time that was, because you could go out and you could explore -- and these were the things that Virginia was doing in Yellow Springs, going to Glen Helen, "the Glen," as it was known then, and now, Glen Helen, which is this huge, beautiful park. And it had an old haunted house, which took her then into THE HOUSE OF DIES DREAR, was actually her next work, which was a mystery. And Arnold did share that that was his actual favorite book of hers. So, but back to M. C. HIGGINS, THE GREAT. So, she had, in between ZEELY and M. C. HIGGINS, THE GREAT, she had THE PLANET OF JUNIOR BROWN and also THE HOUSE OF DIES DREAR. THE PLANET OF JUNIOR BROWN is really a very special story. Arnold felt that way. Susan Hirschman felt that way. Virginia felt it was very special, and honestly, had these feelings that perhaps that book would win the Newberry Medal. And it won a Newberry Honor Book. And her first book, ZEELY, an American Library Association Notable Book. I mean, from the very beginning, Virginia's voice was so unique, and it was being heard within the literary community and being recognized, and it was very, very special.
Laura Maylene Walter (15:22):
Yeah, and your book covers, through excerpting some of her letters and so on, that it wasn't that this was easy. Like any writer, it was hard for her at times. I know the writers listening will probably appreciate hearing this, but with M. C. HIGGINS, she talked about it being a story that maybe she wasn't ready to write right away, and it took a lot of effort and rewrites and revision. So, she was going through that process to end up with this book that ends up just completely catapulting her career and her reputation. Speaking of editing on her first published book, ZEELY, she's working with an editor named Dick Jackson, and apparently, during this process that she's working on it, he wrote her and said, of the manuscript: "Between this line and that line is a chapter. Think about it, Virginia." And I just love that. I feel like that's a great editor to be able to pinpoint, like, "You might be missing a whole chapter that could live in between these two little lines." And he is not telling her what it is or what she has to do, but like, "Hey, just what do you see? What do you think?" So, I just love that, and I thought writers might appreciate hearing that.
Julie K. Rubini (16:25):
I love that quote, too, because with the editors that I've worked with, it's the same thing. The goal is to make the work the best that it can be, and to lend that wonderful hand of an editor and to guide an author. Arnold and I had conversations about this world where anyone can become an author, and works can be self-published. And as Arnold said, the difference between traditionally published and self-published is that mighty hand of the editor. And you and I both know that it's not only the overall editor, but then you have copy editors and there's so many eyes on a book that help guide it to become the absolute best that it can be. I was privileged to see notes on different manuscripts, both while sitting with Arnold in her office the first time that I met with him and interviewed him, and then ultimately, now, I believe that Jamie, since his father has passed, has shared more of her notes and her texts and research materials to the Library of Congress. So, it's full circle for me to the National Book Festival and the Library of Congress speakers. I was in Washington, D.C., doing research at the Library of Congress for the book, when I was there for a different occasion. And so, it's very fun that it brings this full-circle moment. But she worked so hard. She would get up in the morning -- I love their routine -- they would get coffee, and she would go to her office downstairs in their home in Yellow Springs, which is a very contemporary-looking home that he saw the house plans in a magazine.
Laura Maylene Walter (18:03):
Yeah. So, Arnold Adoff is her husband. They met in New York. They end up later moving back to Yellow Springs, as you said. Tell us about their relationship.
Julie K. Rubini (18:13):
They lived near each other, and they would run into each other upon occasion, and he would share that she would borrow money. Sometimes things were just tight for her. She would borrow some money, and he gave her five dollars. And he said, that was back in the day, when you could buy both a pizza and go see a double feature for five bucks in New York City. Then the night happened at the Five Spot Cafe, and Virginia loved to sing. She loved jazz. She went to the Five Spot Cafe, and lo and behold, Arnold is there managing the gentleman who's playing, and I can envision her with her black beret and sunglasses. And in the Five Spot, one doesn't clap to show appreciation, they snap fingers. I have a picture of the Five Spot and the musician playing, and I describe the tin roof -- the music would float up and bounce off of the tin roof. And there's all of these community announcements on a bulletin board behind them, and the tables are close together, and smoke is filling the room, because it's back in the '50's, and Black and White, young and old. And Arnold and Virginia began a conversation. I think they just both saw each other in a different light. And he offered her a ride home. She had a friend with her that evening, so she felt comfortable in getting this ride from Arnold. And I know how at the end of the ride, Arnold asked for a phone number. He didn't have pen and paper to write it down, and phone numbers back in the day were a series of numbers and letters that corresponded with where one lived. And so I said, it's not like comparison today, sharing a text or phone number in a cell phone. So he's repeating. He told me, he kept repeating, repeating, repeating. Charlie Mingus was the musician. Charlie keeps wanting to talk to Arnold, and all the while, he was wanting to remember -- he gets home, and he calls Virginia, and they spoke all the rest of the night. And he said he knew before that conversation was over that he was going to spend the rest of his life with her. And absolutely, he is this White Jewish man from the Bronx. She was this African-American woman from Yellow Springs, Ohio. In 1960, in 22 states, it was still illegal to wed. So, fortunately, that was not the case in New York City. So, they married in New York City. They lived in New York City. They had their first baby, they might have had both Lee and Jamie in New York City. And New York City was changing, you know, in the '60's. Their world was not -- they didn't feel as comfortable in the world as young parents as they did when they were young writers and single and enjoying young, married life together. So, they ultimately moved back to Yellow Springs and they built this home, as I mentioned, and worked from there. Just absolutely flourished. But she worked hard. She talked about how, back to their routines in the morning, they'd have their coffee. She'd go to her office. She was wonderful at correspondence. She'd answer correspondence, and then, she would dive right into whatever work -- or works, sometimes she was working on two at the same time -- and work for a number of hours. Arnold never drove, that native New Yorker, so she would drive. She would go pick up the kids from school, take them wherever they needed to go. And oftentimes, she would then get back to work, and work in the evenings, depending upon what deadline she was under. And so, she was very dedicated to her work and her body of work.
Laura Maylene Walter (21:39):
Yeah. And your book includes her mention that she preferred to start working early in the morning, because she felt that by doing so, she couldn't come up with excuses for not writing, which makes complete sense to me. The day can get away from you, or you can get overwhelmed by everything else in life, but if you write first thing in the morning, then maybe you've gotten it done. But of course, she also, as she became more and more well known and was more sought after for speaking engagements and things like that, I'm sure she had to find the time whenever she could. But she was juggling writing books with many invitations to come speak, or give lectures, et cetera, and her two children, who she wanted to spend a lot of time with. So, it was a busy, busy life. What else can you tell us about her career, once she became Virginia Hamilton, as we all know her, and she was sought after?
Julie K. Rubini (22:30):
You touched upon something that became quite a challenge for her, both from the schedule and wanting to maintain that regularity and needing to, based on the demand for her books, based on her success, and then the literary community pulling her into speaking engagements, or even acceptance of awards, and library visits, and just everything that comes with being a successful author. And we've seen it with very successful authors now, that sometimes they just have to pull back from that and limit themselves. Arnold served as her manager, and I think he was quite helpful in trying to buffer her, to protect her, to allow her to still spend her time creatively, but also recognizing the importance, of course, being present to an accept award, or for a major conference to speak as the keynote. And she wrote all of her speeches. Speaking publicly was not really her natural wheelhouse. She was naturally shy, Arnold would say, but she always rose to the occasion. And I heard so many stories of fans being in awe of how regal she would present herself when she would speak, and that one would not have an inkling of really, how innately shy that she was. So she really had to work not only at being that accomplished writer, but also being that accomplished presenter as well.
Laura Maylene Walter (24:12):
Yeah, I think a lot of authors out there can probably relate, where maybe they'd prefer to be alone with their writing and not in the spotlight, but you do have to, hopefully, find a way to be engaging before an audience. It sounds like she was particularly talented in that respect. I have a few kind of random tidbits from your book that I just loved. I'll just mention them -- fun facts that if you want to comment on any of them, feel free. But one is that in her earlier days in New York, she passed on the opportunity to be a contributor to THE NEW YORKER, because she wanted to focus on her novels, which I think really speaks to her vision for herself and her career at that time. Because I would imagine a lot of writers would love to be a contributor to THE NEW YORKER. So, that was interesting to me. And also, just through reading your book, you get a sense of how technology changed with typewriters and computers. You have a letter in there where she apologizes to her editor for her typewriter keys being dirty, but she couldn't clean them at the moment, so she just types the letter. Moving on to when she gets a computer, you have a photo in there with her and a very old-school computer, and that it seems like she delighted in being able to edit on the screen right there, and it saved her time. I thought these were some good snippets into her life as a writer during the years she was working.
Julie K. Rubini (25:35):
Yes, and reflective of her personality, I think something that I found very interesting was her love of both jaguars and of frogs -- that she started a collection of frogs when they were traveling. And so, when I do events, whether school visits or book festivals, I've handed out little frog stickers in honor of her, and you'll note on the page numbers, there is actually an imprint of a little frog.
Laura Maylene Walter (26:00):
Yes.
Julie K. Rubini (26:01):
Also, in the book, each chapter is titled -- it's a literary term, if you will, you know, "setting," "character..."
Laura Maylene Walter (26:11):
"Voice..."
Julie K. Rubini (26:12):
Yes, relative to a writer's life as well.
Laura Maylene Walter (26:15):
Well, speaking of frogs, you also mentioned a frog joke in the book: "What did the frog order at McDonald's?"
Julie K. Rubini (26:22):
Oh my gosh, I don't remember.
Laura Maylene Walter (26:23):
I was wondering if I would stump you.
Julie K. Rubini (26:26):
Maybe, French flies?
Laura Maylene Walter (26:28):
That's halfway correct. "French flies and diet croak."
Julie K. Rubini (26:33):
Oh, that's very cute. There you go.
Laura Maylene Walter (26:35):
You heard it here on Page Count, everyone! But on a more serious note, one thing I love about this book, because it is for young readers, in addition to all this great information about Virginia Hamilton, her life, her career, her family -- the photographs are really wonderful in this book. But you also include some educational bits to teach kids about things such as the Underground Railroad, laws surrounding interracial marriage in the United States, strip mining. And I didn't know, I've been to the wilds, the Animal Reserve in Central Ohio, and I didn't realize that was, I believe, on the site of a former strip mine. And even just the history of phone numbers and how that works, and vocabulary words that kids might want to look up in the back of the book. So, I'm curious if you could talk about that a bit. How did that come together and how did you manage weaving together this biography with some additional information for kids?
Julie K. Rubini (27:32):
So, the format of the book -- I cannot take credit for that. That stems from Ohio University Press, where this is Virginia's book. VIRGINIA HAMILTON, AMERICA'S STORYTELLER, is one of the series of biographies for young readers. It's an incredible series for any educators listening. It's wonderful. I think the initial goal was to highlight Ohioans that maybe hadn't really had a light shine on them. Virginia, there were some records written for her, but not really in this middle-grade, YA space that she wrote predominantly for. So, I thought it was very important to include her. I mean, you can't tell her story enough. But the format was driven by Ohio University Press. It was my choice, however, whatever topics that I wanted to include in those sidebars, as well as the "Did you know?" at the end of the chapter. For me, something that was relative within each chapter that I thought children, young people would find interesting, given the times that we live in now, and what the times were like. Then, as you say, like the phone numbers, even the comparison of Loving versus Virginia, with Blacks being able to marry Whites and vice versa, and how that was relative to the rights to engage, to marry. That made it relative to young people, that it was just really important for young people to understand the times, to learn a little bit, dive in a little bit more so into some of the topics that were touched upon within the text, to give them context.
Laura Maylene Walter (29:10):
Can you take us back to how you came to write this book for Ohio University Press?
Julie K. Rubini (29:17):
I had already written a book on Millie Benson, who is the original Nancy Drew ghost writer. It is the only biography of that, and knowing that, I wrote that title in a little different way -- more journalistically, because Millie was really a journalist and happened to write 135 children's books, in addition to twenty-three of the first Nancy Drew mystery stories. But I felt that it was really important to highlight women, Ohio women of note, and Ohio women writers. And I was aware of Virginia -- I knew of the Virginia Hamilton Conference for Multicultural Literature that had been staged at Kent State for a good number of years, but I had not been. Coincidentally, my husband and I sadly lost our oldest daughter, Claire, in 2000, and we chose to honor her love of reading by establishing a children's book festival. We felt it important to have a variety of authors and illustrators, to really be a diverse lineup of authors and illustrators. And so, I would often attend book festivals and events to meet, approach, invite, authors, illustrators to Claire's Day. And one of those individuals who was presenting at the Virginia Hamilton Conference is Angela Johnson. I reached out to her beforehand -- I didn't just show up. I introduced, and I told her our story. He always said, "Mutual admiration from the beginning with Angela." It didn't take much of anything to even get her to come, even though Angela doesn't drive. So, it didn't take much of anything to get Angela, who lives near Kent State, to come and visit us. I think Angela actually has been with us twice. So it was then at the Virginia Hamilton Conference that I really -- I mean, it was like the skies opened up and I was enlightened as to how significant Virginia was in the world of children's literature. And it just made me think that her story ought to be one of these serious biographies for young readers published by Ohio University Press, and true to form, with anything nonfiction, one is to submit a proposal. And in the case of an academic press, it is the Editorial Academic Board that reviews. So, it was fully approved. It was a dream for me -- from reaching out to Arnold and meeting with Arnold, to be in their home, to be in her office, to talking to family, talking to individuals at Kent State, to going to Kent State and seeing their archives there, to going to the Historical Society, to diving into Antioch. I mean, any one of my books, you can go to that back matter, and one could write their own separate -- in fact, my book on Virginia has already served as a resource. Nina Cruz wrote a beautiful picture book. EXTRAORDINARY MAGIC: THE STORYTELLING LIFE OF VIRGINIA HAMILTON is the title of her picture book, and she credits my research in helping to guide her in hers. And the same with Millie Benson is that I've received nice accolades from my writing, but also for my research. That is very important, especially to see and review and include information from primary documents: letters, communications, et cetera. They tell so much of the story.
Laura Maylene Walter (32:47):
So, Virginia Hamilton passed away in 2002. She had breast cancer. And I believe -- did Arnold Pass away in 2021? A few years ago?
Julie K. Rubini (32:57):
Yes.
Laura Maylene Walter (32:58):
He was a children's author as well. So can you tell us about your relationship with him, and how visiting him impacted your research for this book?
Julie K. Rubini (33:09):
You know, one tries to remain unbiased, I guess, as one researches one's subject, but it was difficult not to become a friend with Arnold right from the very beginning. He was so hospitable. He was so kind, generous with his time. He painted this vision of what their life was like as husband and wife, and as a family, from the marinara sauce bubbling in the kitchen while they're -- you know, I could just smell it. I make my own homemade marinara, so I got it. I understood that their day to day as writers, and checking in with each other, and reading to each other, and sharing with each other. I fell in love with both of them. I just loved their love, and I love their love story. Then, to have some communication with Jamie, I wish honestly that I'd had some more, and Lee lives over in Europe. But Arnold painted such an incredible picture of their family. There were some quotes from Jamie and Lee from the past that I included within the book, but it just sounded like a wonderful life as a family, as writers, the support of each other. He was truly a Renaissance man. He was so incredibly supportive of her, not jealous of her meteoric rise, always in support and her success is a lot in credit to that relationship with Arnold. Yes, being an author of children's works himself and being successful, and he was an anthologist, and he was a professor and a teacher, and he had his own workings going on, but all the while, he helped manage her and helped nurture her. And when I say "manage," I don't like the connotation of the word, because he was assisting her with contracts and with negotiations and things, just so that she could focus more on the creative work, and he took care of the business side. I met with him several times at their home. We had dinner at a nice restaurant. I have a great picture of the two of us from that night. He was kind enough to read the manuscript and gave his blessing, which was so important to me, because I thought, given his experience, given his relationship with Virginia, that this was very much his story as much as Virginia's, and I really wanted his approval and support, and he was very kind. He was the first phone call that I made when I learned about receiving the Kirkus Star review, and that I made when I learned that it made the Bank Street College of Education listing for outstanding merit. And he was so proud, and I think, tears. I mean, it was just joyful for both of us. So, I'm going to start to cry. I miss him.
Laura Maylene Walter (36:05):
He sounds wonderful, and it sounds that he and Virginia had a beautiful relationship. And I know their son, Jamie, is an author as well. I believe so. The legacy continues, for sure.
Julie K. Rubini (36:16):
He has a work that he's co-authored. It was a manuscript that his mother had. So, Jamie has two books coming out within the next couple of years, and we've had Jamie with us at Claire's Day, and I can't wait to have him back at Claire's Day again, once his other works come out. So, we're excited about that.
Laura Maylene Walter (36:31):
You mentioned your book, MISSING MILLIE BENSON: THE SECRET CASE OF THE NANCY DREW GHOST WRITER AND JOURNALIST, which actually does in a roundabout way have a connection to Virginia Hamilton, because she, apparently, I learned from your book, loved Nancy Drew books and Nancy Drew mysteries. At Page Count here, we're fans of Nancy Drew. We did an episode focusing on Mildred Benson. So, I think that sounds like a perfect subject for a book. So, I'll have to check that one out as well. But I am also curious. You mentioned Claire's Day, which is the festival you created in memory of your daughter. What a lovely way to pay tribute to someone, and that she loved reading, and you've created this wonderful event out of it. So, I'm wondering if you could share with listeners -- give us a peek into Claire's Day. What does it look like? It's in Northwest Ohio. What is typically featured at the event? And am I correct that the spring of 2026 will be its 25th anniversary? Is that correct?
Julie K. Rubini (37:32):
Absolutely correct. So, I'll tell you that the history, which again, brings us so full circle to me, that six months after we lost Claire, Brad and I felt compelled to honor Claire in a way that was true to her. We also felt compelled to honor relationships with each other as husband and wife, and with our two other children. And so I'm very blessed to say that we've received many awards, recognition, accolades for the work that we've done through Claire's Day. But to me, what's most significant is having those relationships with my husband, with two other children. And I can say that we're very happy, and we have amazing relationships. We're both very proud of that. But with Claire, at ten, she read high school level. So it was a challenge as a parent to find works that were content appropriate for her, but she also encouraged others in their journey, including my husband, who is dyslexic. And at night, when we would read, Claire recognized that he was switching out words, substituting words, doing all the creative things that that lovely brain of his would do in reading to compensate for what he was challenged with. So, six months after we lost Claire, we're on a flight to Jacksonville for my niece's wedding, and in my seat pocket is a Time magazine. I pick it up. I start flipping through. I see an article on the Texas Book Festival and former First Lady Laura Bush's involvement. And what really resonated with me was the fact that the Texas Book Festival features primarily Texas-born authors, illustrators, or those who have written about Texas. And since I had left my career in the hospitality industry -- marketing and sales management -- I was blessed to be able to be at home with the kids. But I was freelance writing, because I always loved to write, and I thought it was important that as we read the stories to the children, that they understood who wrote the words and who drew the pictures. So, I knew through that exercise that we had a wealth of talent in our backyard here in Ohio --Northwest Ohio, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana. So, I'm reading this article about the Texas Book Festival, and I start to cry. And six months out, a song -- anything -- can bring one to tears. I handed the article to Brad, and I said, "This is what we're going to do to honor Claire." And behind me is a letter on White House stationery from Laura Bush, who learned about our efforts from then-Governor First Lady, Hope Taft, about honoring our little reader gone too soon. Something incredible that we do, given this relationship with Brad and with Claire, and her encouragement of others, to encourage their love of reading and improve their reading skills, is that we give out to children chosen by their schools as the most improved readers. Not the best readers, but we give these children a personalized certificate. It's a C.A.R.E. Award, Claire's Award for Reading Excellence, as well as a coupon to choose their very own book from the authors and the illustrators at Claire's Day. We're not huge. We generally have about a dozen authors and illustrators, but we are no longer just a day. We have, still, the flagship Claire's Day is always the third Saturday in May in Maumee, Ohio, which is the community where we raised Claire and visited that library. It's on the grounds and inside the Maumee Branch Library. And then we have the first Saturday in May. We are now at the Toledo Main Library and celebrate young readers there. We started out -- 2002 was our very first Thursday, and we recognized maybe twenty-five young readers. We now average 1,200 children, and we have partnerships with almost forty schools who host our authors and illustrators, which is huge for the authors and illustrators, because they are getting paid their honorarium, whatever they command for an honorarium, for a full-day school visit or a half-day school visit. They're paid by the schools. And so, it's a win-win, because oftentimes we authors, you probably know this experience yourself as an author, is that the expectation is that you would go to a book festival. You're paying for your hotel. You're paying for your expenses. You have the opportunity to meet readers, and maybe, in my case as a children's book author, to meet teachers and educators, and therefore open up the possibilities of school visits. But you know, one has to make a living as well. And I think it's one of the very few industries that I'm aware of, that you're expected to do these things and not receive some kind of compensation. So we take care of our authors and illustrators. We host them for dinner the night before. We have a Claire's Night, very fun dinner, before Toledo. We take them out to dinner before Claire's Day in Maumee. We just really try and take care of them as best as we can. We have the school visit honorarium. Several of them get multiple school visits. So, it's all a very good thing. So yeah, Claire's Day is really kind of like two weeks, three weeks of literary experiences in Northwest Ohio, and it's just absolutely beautiful.
Laura Maylene Walter (42:35):
It's so fantastic. And you said it's not the biggest festival in terms of numbers of authors, but really, it doesn't have to be the biggest event in the state to make a huge impact in recognizing 1,200 readers. That's just amazing.
Julie K. Rubini (42:49):
These children are typically not receiving academic accolades. One of our longtime volunteers said to me last year, she said, "You know, it didn't really occur to me until this year is that these children don't know what this experience is like." Many of them are very shy, some of them are proud. But what I'm really impressed with is that family members in multiples come to support these children and they're clapping. It's like a big love fest, these C.A.R.E. Awards, and they happen all day long. So we have 1,200 children recognized. We've got forty school visits. We did the numbers. We impact now, annually, about 25,000 children and their families.
Laura Maylene Walter (43:28):
That's so impressive. I love it. I love it, and I love that this book, this Virginia Hamilton biography is representing Ohio at the National Book Festival on September 6th, everyone, in Washington, D.C. And I hear you'll be on hand to maybe sign some books, and to be there to keep completing that full circle experience of how this all came to be. And just happy to have you on the podcast. You are an Ohioan writing about an Ohio author, and you have created something quite special with Claire's Day, an Ohio book festival for children. So, it's just really perfect and fantastic. And I'm wondering before we go, is there anything you'd like to share with us about what you might be working on next, or what you hope to work on next?
Julie K. Rubini (44:16):
Thank you for asking. I've actually written my first middle-grade novel. I've had it in the hands of readers, some through SCBWI, which is such a great source, as you know, for writers and illustrators. And I have it in the hands of an editor acquaintance, so we'll hope to see what happens. It is a fictional account of our travels as a family, three years after we lost Claire, and our first major motor home trip out West in the eyes of the youngest, who our son was actually just nine at that time and our daughter, eleven, but I bumped their ages up. He's eleven and he both journals, as well as, it's from his first person perspective as to where this family is at three years after this loss, and where they're going literally, physically, and emotionally on their journey. And I have such high hopes. My kids have read it. I asked for their permission first. My kids have read it. My husband has read it. I've gotten some great feedback on it. So, knock on wood. I wanted to tell our story, somehow. And I think this would be a perfect way for kids who have experienced any significant loss to relate to. And it's very positive. There's a lot of humor, because we're all -- we deal with humor with all that we've had to deal with, and lots of adventures, and lots of learning experiences about this amazing country that we live in. So, fingers crossed. It was so fun when I told Trisha Springs stuff, who has been with us at Claire's Day a number of times, when I told her I wrote this middle-grade novel. She's like, "Well, it's about time."
Laura Maylene Walter (46:03):
I know Trisha. She's great. She'll be on the pod soon as well. And yes, I was thinking about her, actually, as you were talking, I was like, "I could see this being in conversation with Trisha's work in general." And yeah, I'm so excited for you. I love it. I love that you have embarked on middle-grade fiction, and I think Virginia Hamilton would like that as well. I think she'd be very pleased for you. Well, this has been so lovely. I so appreciate your time. I thought maybe I could end on a quote from Virginia Hamilton that was in your book, just tying up the Ohio loose ends of it all. So, she moved to New York when she was young, and of course it sounds like she had that typical young person point of view: "There's nothing for me in Yellow Springs. I have to get out of here and go to New York." And then, after ten or so years, she came back to Yellow Springs. So, this is Virginia Hamilton, having lived ten or more years in New York: "I discovered that my mind had never left Ohio. And so I returned to the river and the country. I could write. I had done it. I had pulled past and present memory and experience together and grown deep like the river." Thought that might be a nice note to end on. But Julie, thank you so much for being here and for sharing all this information about Virginia Hamilton, and Claire's Day, and beyond. We really appreciate it.
Julie K. Rubini (47:22):
Thank you so much.
Laura Maylene Walter (47:28):
Page Count is presented by the Ohio Center for the Book at Cleveland Public Library. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate, and leave a review for Page Count wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more online, or find the edited transcript for this episode at cpl.org/podcast/page-count. Follow us on Instagram at Ohio Center for the Book, or find us on Facebook. If you'd like to get in touch, email ohiocenterforthebook@cpl.org. Put "podcast" in the subject line. Thanks for listening, and we'll be back in two weeks for another chapter of Page Count.
Just their day-to-day as writers and checking in with each other, and reading to each other, and sharing with each other. I fell in love with both of them. I just loved their love, and I love their love story.
Laura Maylene Walter (00:19):
Welcome to Page Count, presented by the Ohio Center for the Book at Cleveland Public Library. This podcast celebrates authors, illustrators, librarians, booksellers, literary advocates, and readers in and from the state of Ohio. I'm your host, Laura Maylene Walter, the Ohio Center for the Book Fellow and author of the novel, BODY OF STARS. Today, we're going to celebrate one of the most honored American children's book authors of all time, Virginia Hamilton. Julie K. Rubini is here to discuss her biography for young readers, VIRGINIA HAMILTON, AMERICA'S STORYTELLER, which will represent Ohio at the 2025 National Book Festival as the state's Great Reads from Great Places, Youth Selection. Julie, welcome to the podcast, and thank you so much for being here.
Julie K. Rubini (01:10):
And thank you so much for having me.
Laura Maylene Walter (01:12):
We have a lot to cover today, but I thought the best place to start would be Virginia Hamilton herself, because your book is such a beautiful tribute to her and covers so much ground regarding her life and work. It's really, really quite amazing. So, I think a lot of our listeners surely know just how great of an impact Virginia Hamilton has made on children's literature. And I could rattle off a lot of the awards she has won -- everything from the Newbury Medal, the National Book Award, the Coretta Scott King Award, the Hans Christian Andersen Medal, the MacArthur Fellowship Genius Grant, and on and on and on. But let's get a sense of how Virginia Hamilton was able to become such a beloved author. Can you start by telling us about her origins, how she grew up in Yellow Springs, Ohio? What was her young life like?
Julie K. Rubini (02:04):
That's an absolutely perfect place to start. She grew up among storytellers. Yeah, a great influencer in her life was her grandfather, Levi Perry, who was rescued from slavery by his mother, Mary Cloud. They escaped Virginia and made their way to family who had settled in Jamestown, Ohio. She was surrounded by, I say much like the fireflies that were on the farm there near Yellow Springs, that the stories just flooded and floated through her consciousness as a young child, as a little girl. And every year, her Grandfather Levi would share that story. He gathered the family around about how he was spared from a life of slavery because of the bravery of his mother, Mary Cloud. And there's a little mystery to that, because nobody really knows what happened to Mary Cloud, that she brought Levi up through Virginia, across the Ohio River, to this little town of Jamestown outside of Yellow Springs. And then, there's no reported history of what happened to Mary Cloud. Levi was raised and he had children, including Virginia's mother, Etta Belle, and he'd sit these children, his ten children, around and tell them that story about how he was so fortunate. And they consequently were all fortunate, because they were not to be experiencing this life of slavery as his mother did, and how important it was to him for them to know that, to appreciate what their lives could have looked like otherwise. And she listened, and she was in awe. She wrote about holding her grandfather's hand, which was damaged from an accident in a factory that he worked in. And she so loved her grandfather -- there was one comment about how he could jump up in the air and click his heels three times before he came back down to the ground. And she could ever, never have seen that. And how she had these aunts and great aunts who would tell these stories of the War of the Worlds -- Orson Wells, the War of the Worlds radio program, which terrified the country at the time -- and how the response from both sides of the family -- how one aunt was so frightened that she ran out into the farm, and she started shooting up in the air at anything that moved, and the other side sequestered themselves down in the basement. So, just these stories and gossip. And Virginia, she admitted that she didn't really have that gift of sharing those stories verbally, but she had this gift of reporting them. And when she was, gosh -- eight, nine, ten years old, she had what she called "the Notebook," and she reported these stories, and she's just like that little fly on the wall and reporting all of these stories...
Laura Maylene Walter (05:04):
Like secrets, right. Family secrets. I bet it was so juicy.
Julie K. Rubini (05:10):
. You know, there was a description of her sitting up on the hog barn, the metal roof. And I can imagine how hot it might be in the summertime, but she's just listening and observing and recording. And then she lost the Notebook. And Arnold, when I first met with him -- we could have a whole conversation about my relationship, friendship with Arnold -- such a wonderful human being. He shared that she lamented that loss for the entirety of the rest of her life, that whatever was in there was lost. So, maybe it might have encouraged her to continue to record her thoughts and notes, and to hold onto those and not to lose them, based on this early experience of loss. And then the library was very instrumental as the family segued into Yellow Springs. Her father worked at the Antioch Tea Room, making his way up to the manager of the Tea Room, which offered her great exposure to students from all across the country, and even the world, at Antioch. So, it gave her a very early worldly view. And her mother, who raised the children and raised hens. They had special hens that made a variety of colors of eggs, and Virginia was very curious about them. So, her mother encouraged her to go to the library to learn more about these hens and these eggs, and Virginia loved at first sight. She learned later that her mother was wise, that by sending Virginia to the library, Virginia would learn. She would learn, and not only about those chickens and those eggs, but she would just immerse herself in stories and books, and learn about African folk tales, and learn about history, and learn about characters, and all of these books that fueled her imagination.
Laura Maylene Walter (06:56):
Yeah. So, from a young age, she knew she wanted to be a writer. You have a quote that, I'm not sure how old she was, but she told her sister that she was going to grow up to be a famous author, which, guess what. It happened, Virginia.
Julie K. Rubini (07:08):
Her sister said, "Well, fine. Then I'm going to be famous too," you know?
Laura Maylene Walter (07:11):
Yeah, I know. I love that. . So she grows up in Yellow Springs. She ends up going to Antioch when a community member advocates for her to get a scholarship. But in these years, maybe her teenage years, what was it like for Black families, or a Black girl growing up in Yellow Springs during this time?
Julie K. Rubini (07:31):
Very inclusive community. Virginia had extended family. She had cousins who lived there. The sense I received from Arnold was that it was very much an inclusive, outside of -- I tell the story of how, when she was a little girl, they would go to the little theater, where it was sectioned off with the Whites being able to sit in the front, and Blacks in the back, that soon after -- I mean, she was maybe eight or nine -- where the community rose to that and said, "You know, this is not right." And Antioch College students actually staged a protest where, initially, the White students sat in the front and the Blacks in the back, and then they all began switching seats. And management was so perplexed. Somebody got wind of it, and ultimately, they eliminated the barriers, and anyone could sit wherever they wanted to. And I sensed that there was not discrimination, based on these timeframes, the 50's, primarily in her teen years, that much of the country was experiencing at the time, because of how special Yellow Springs is, and how inclusive. And that, I think, really helped serve this foundation for Virginia, where she felt very accepted, and she didn't feel limited in anything that she wished to do or accomplish. And that was fueled by her, of course, her family, and the support of the family, her professors at Antioch -- yes, she did obtain, ultimately, a scholarship to go to Antioch. Interesting -- she never graduated from Antioch. She had a professor at Antioch who suggested that she should go to the Ohio State University and learn under her professor there. And that professor encouraged her to go to New York City, because back in the fifties, if you wanted to become published, that's what you did. So, here's Virginia Hamilton, the most honored author of children's literature ever, without having outside of an honorary degree. She did not have an actual degree. She didn't need it. As her professor said, "You're well on your way. Just go to New York." And that she did. And this becomes part of my favorite part of her story, and that was, when she's living in this very small apartment, she has a bathtub. She puts a board over top of the bathtub to serve as her desk. We had typewriters back then, and she was working multiple jobs, along with attempting to become this famous author. And she was doing singing gigs. She was working as a secretary. I mean, she was very tenacious and resilient and doing all that she could to make this happen. And meanwhile, several things were happening -- one of which was that one of her classmates at Antioch was a woman named Janet Schulman, who told her that one of her stories, that one of her essays that she wrote while she was at Antioch, she envisioned as a children's story. And Janet worked for a publisher, and so, she really encouraged Virginia to move forward with that story in the realm of a children's book. And that ultimately became ZEELY, which was her very first published work.
Laura Maylene Walter (10:40):
It really shows how important it is for aspiring or growing writers to have support in all forms. You know, if she hadn't had someone advocate for her to get the scholarship to Antioch, she wouldn't have ended up there. Or at OSU, where she was encouraged to go to New York, and then, the friend remembering her story and saying, "This could be a children's --" It's really amazing that she did it all herself, of course, and I love that image of her in the tub with the board across the tub -- but to have this support at such key moments. And I was really intrigued by the fact that she, originally, in New York, was trying to write a book for adults. It was titled MAYO, and the editor couldn't believe that, basically, a Black woman could write from the point of view of a male protagonist. And that book, for the time being, didn't really go anywhere. Can you tell us a bit more about that, and the impact that had on her future writing career?
Julie K. Rubini (11:37):
Absolutely. And I think once ZEELY was published, and she said she really didn't know from the outset, she didn't really know anything about writing children's books, but she took it on very quickly and very well. And after the success of ZEELY, probably, although I didn't find this out for a fact, but given the role that Janet was serving -- and then, having been introduced to other editors, I'm sure, as it works now, that one gets published and then they want to know, "Well, what other works do you have?" Perhaps, what's in those file folders, if you will. And here, she has this adult novel, and likely encouraged that based on the success of ZEELY, that she should consider creating this story for children as well. And she told her editor, Susan Hirschman, that she kept having this vision of this boy with lettuce leaves wrapped around his wrist, and it was such a vivid image for her. And she's sitting down with Susan Hirschman in her office in New York City, and Susan said, "Well, you just need to follow a story. You know, find a story." And the next thing you know, he's M.C. Higgins, the Great. He loves to perch atop a forty-foot pole and look down and over Sarah's Mountain, which was supposed to be his mountain. And it comes to be that we understand that strip mining is occurring at Sarah's Mountain, and it's tearing his world literally apart. And then, he has the friendship with Ben, and I'm forgetting this character's last name, but a Black character, M.C. Higgins, and a White character and befriending -- and you know, they live out in the country - just quintessential stories of kids living in the country. I was raised in the country, so I could identify with Virginia's stories of being out in the country, or in the case of ZEELY, where the brother and the sister, they go to their uncle's, and they meet this woman who resembles a Tutsi queen. And just the setting, the imaginations, the experiences, quite honestly, took me quite back to my childhood, sitting with Arnold -- White, Jewish man from the Bronx. There's a story in itself. We'll get to that in a second. But he said, "If it weren't for the cover, the book covers of her stories, you wouldn't know whether her characters were White or Black." You know, that they had these rural experiences as children that I had, growing up in the '60's and the '70's. What a wonderful, treasured time that was, because you could go out and you could explore -- and these were the things that Virginia was doing in Yellow Springs, going to Glen Helen, "the Glen," as it was known then, and now, Glen Helen, which is this huge, beautiful park. And it had an old haunted house, which took her then into THE HOUSE OF DIES DREAR, was actually her next work, which was a mystery. And Arnold did share that that was his actual favorite book of hers. So, but back to M. C. HIGGINS, THE GREAT. So, she had, in between ZEELY and M. C. HIGGINS, THE GREAT, she had THE PLANET OF JUNIOR BROWN and also THE HOUSE OF DIES DREAR. THE PLANET OF JUNIOR BROWN is really a very special story. Arnold felt that way. Susan Hirschman felt that way. Virginia felt it was very special, and honestly, had these feelings that perhaps that book would win the Newberry Medal. And it won a Newberry Honor Book. And her first book, ZEELY, an American Library Association Notable Book. I mean, from the very beginning, Virginia's voice was so unique, and it was being heard within the literary community and being recognized, and it was very, very special.
Laura Maylene Walter (15:22):
Yeah, and your book covers, through excerpting some of her letters and so on, that it wasn't that this was easy. Like any writer, it was hard for her at times. I know the writers listening will probably appreciate hearing this, but with M. C. HIGGINS, she talked about it being a story that maybe she wasn't ready to write right away, and it took a lot of effort and rewrites and revision. So, she was going through that process to end up with this book that ends up just completely catapulting her career and her reputation. Speaking of editing on her first published book, ZEELY, she's working with an editor named Dick Jackson, and apparently, during this process that she's working on it, he wrote her and said, of the manuscript: "Between this line and that line is a chapter. Think about it, Virginia." And I just love that. I feel like that's a great editor to be able to pinpoint, like, "You might be missing a whole chapter that could live in between these two little lines." And he is not telling her what it is or what she has to do, but like, "Hey, just what do you see? What do you think?" So, I just love that, and I thought writers might appreciate hearing that.
Julie K. Rubini (16:25):
I love that quote, too, because with the editors that I've worked with, it's the same thing. The goal is to make the work the best that it can be, and to lend that wonderful hand of an editor and to guide an author. Arnold and I had conversations about this world where anyone can become an author, and works can be self-published. And as Arnold said, the difference between traditionally published and self-published is that mighty hand of the editor. And you and I both know that it's not only the overall editor, but then you have copy editors and there's so many eyes on a book that help guide it to become the absolute best that it can be. I was privileged to see notes on different manuscripts, both while sitting with Arnold in her office the first time that I met with him and interviewed him, and then ultimately, now, I believe that Jamie, since his father has passed, has shared more of her notes and her texts and research materials to the Library of Congress. So, it's full circle for me to the National Book Festival and the Library of Congress speakers. I was in Washington, D.C., doing research at the Library of Congress for the book, when I was there for a different occasion. And so, it's very fun that it brings this full-circle moment. But she worked so hard. She would get up in the morning -- I love their routine -- they would get coffee, and she would go to her office downstairs in their home in Yellow Springs, which is a very contemporary-looking home that he saw the house plans in a magazine.
Laura Maylene Walter (18:03):
Yeah. So, Arnold Adoff is her husband. They met in New York. They end up later moving back to Yellow Springs, as you said. Tell us about their relationship.
Julie K. Rubini (18:13):
They lived near each other, and they would run into each other upon occasion, and he would share that she would borrow money. Sometimes things were just tight for her. She would borrow some money, and he gave her five dollars. And he said, that was back in the day, when you could buy both a pizza and go see a double feature for five bucks in New York City. Then the night happened at the Five Spot Cafe, and Virginia loved to sing. She loved jazz. She went to the Five Spot Cafe, and lo and behold, Arnold is there managing the gentleman who's playing, and I can envision her with her black beret and sunglasses. And in the Five Spot, one doesn't clap to show appreciation, they snap fingers. I have a picture of the Five Spot and the musician playing, and I describe the tin roof -- the music would float up and bounce off of the tin roof. And there's all of these community announcements on a bulletin board behind them, and the tables are close together, and smoke is filling the room, because it's back in the '50's, and Black and White, young and old. And Arnold and Virginia began a conversation. I think they just both saw each other in a different light. And he offered her a ride home. She had a friend with her that evening, so she felt comfortable in getting this ride from Arnold. And I know how at the end of the ride, Arnold asked for a phone number. He didn't have pen and paper to write it down, and phone numbers back in the day were a series of numbers and letters that corresponded with where one lived. And so I said, it's not like comparison today, sharing a text or phone number in a cell phone. So he's repeating. He told me, he kept repeating, repeating, repeating. Charlie Mingus was the musician. Charlie keeps wanting to talk to Arnold, and all the while, he was wanting to remember -- he gets home, and he calls Virginia, and they spoke all the rest of the night. And he said he knew before that conversation was over that he was going to spend the rest of his life with her. And absolutely, he is this White Jewish man from the Bronx. She was this African-American woman from Yellow Springs, Ohio. In 1960, in 22 states, it was still illegal to wed. So, fortunately, that was not the case in New York City. So, they married in New York City. They lived in New York City. They had their first baby, they might have had both Lee and Jamie in New York City. And New York City was changing, you know, in the '60's. Their world was not -- they didn't feel as comfortable in the world as young parents as they did when they were young writers and single and enjoying young, married life together. So, they ultimately moved back to Yellow Springs and they built this home, as I mentioned, and worked from there. Just absolutely flourished. But she worked hard. She talked about how, back to their routines in the morning, they'd have their coffee. She'd go to her office. She was wonderful at correspondence. She'd answer correspondence, and then, she would dive right into whatever work -- or works, sometimes she was working on two at the same time -- and work for a number of hours. Arnold never drove, that native New Yorker, so she would drive. She would go pick up the kids from school, take them wherever they needed to go. And oftentimes, she would then get back to work, and work in the evenings, depending upon what deadline she was under. And so, she was very dedicated to her work and her body of work.
Laura Maylene Walter (21:39):
Yeah. And your book includes her mention that she preferred to start working early in the morning, because she felt that by doing so, she couldn't come up with excuses for not writing, which makes complete sense to me. The day can get away from you, or you can get overwhelmed by everything else in life, but if you write first thing in the morning, then maybe you've gotten it done. But of course, she also, as she became more and more well known and was more sought after for speaking engagements and things like that, I'm sure she had to find the time whenever she could. But she was juggling writing books with many invitations to come speak, or give lectures, et cetera, and her two children, who she wanted to spend a lot of time with. So, it was a busy, busy life. What else can you tell us about her career, once she became Virginia Hamilton, as we all know her, and she was sought after?
Julie K. Rubini (22:30):
You touched upon something that became quite a challenge for her, both from the schedule and wanting to maintain that regularity and needing to, based on the demand for her books, based on her success, and then the literary community pulling her into speaking engagements, or even acceptance of awards, and library visits, and just everything that comes with being a successful author. And we've seen it with very successful authors now, that sometimes they just have to pull back from that and limit themselves. Arnold served as her manager, and I think he was quite helpful in trying to buffer her, to protect her, to allow her to still spend her time creatively, but also recognizing the importance, of course, being present to an accept award, or for a major conference to speak as the keynote. And she wrote all of her speeches. Speaking publicly was not really her natural wheelhouse. She was naturally shy, Arnold would say, but she always rose to the occasion. And I heard so many stories of fans being in awe of how regal she would present herself when she would speak, and that one would not have an inkling of really, how innately shy that she was. So she really had to work not only at being that accomplished writer, but also being that accomplished presenter as well.
Laura Maylene Walter (24:12):
Yeah, I think a lot of authors out there can probably relate, where maybe they'd prefer to be alone with their writing and not in the spotlight, but you do have to, hopefully, find a way to be engaging before an audience. It sounds like she was particularly talented in that respect. I have a few kind of random tidbits from your book that I just loved. I'll just mention them -- fun facts that if you want to comment on any of them, feel free. But one is that in her earlier days in New York, she passed on the opportunity to be a contributor to THE NEW YORKER, because she wanted to focus on her novels, which I think really speaks to her vision for herself and her career at that time. Because I would imagine a lot of writers would love to be a contributor to THE NEW YORKER. So, that was interesting to me. And also, just through reading your book, you get a sense of how technology changed with typewriters and computers. You have a letter in there where she apologizes to her editor for her typewriter keys being dirty, but she couldn't clean them at the moment, so she just types the letter. Moving on to when she gets a computer, you have a photo in there with her and a very old-school computer, and that it seems like she delighted in being able to edit on the screen right there, and it saved her time. I thought these were some good snippets into her life as a writer during the years she was working.
Julie K. Rubini (25:35):
Yes, and reflective of her personality, I think something that I found very interesting was her love of both jaguars and of frogs -- that she started a collection of frogs when they were traveling. And so, when I do events, whether school visits or book festivals, I've handed out little frog stickers in honor of her, and you'll note on the page numbers, there is actually an imprint of a little frog.
Laura Maylene Walter (26:00):
Yes.
Julie K. Rubini (26:01):
Also, in the book, each chapter is titled -- it's a literary term, if you will, you know, "setting," "character..."
Laura Maylene Walter (26:11):
"Voice..."
Julie K. Rubini (26:12):
Yes, relative to a writer's life as well.
Laura Maylene Walter (26:15):
Well, speaking of frogs, you also mentioned a frog joke in the book: "What did the frog order at McDonald's?"
Julie K. Rubini (26:22):
Oh my gosh, I don't remember.
Laura Maylene Walter (26:23):
I was wondering if I would stump you.
Julie K. Rubini (26:26):
Maybe, French flies?
Laura Maylene Walter (26:28):
That's halfway correct. "French flies and diet croak."
Julie K. Rubini (26:33):
Oh, that's very cute. There you go.
Laura Maylene Walter (26:35):
You heard it here on Page Count, everyone! But on a more serious note, one thing I love about this book, because it is for young readers, in addition to all this great information about Virginia Hamilton, her life, her career, her family -- the photographs are really wonderful in this book. But you also include some educational bits to teach kids about things such as the Underground Railroad, laws surrounding interracial marriage in the United States, strip mining. And I didn't know, I've been to the wilds, the Animal Reserve in Central Ohio, and I didn't realize that was, I believe, on the site of a former strip mine. And even just the history of phone numbers and how that works, and vocabulary words that kids might want to look up in the back of the book. So, I'm curious if you could talk about that a bit. How did that come together and how did you manage weaving together this biography with some additional information for kids?
Julie K. Rubini (27:32):
So, the format of the book -- I cannot take credit for that. That stems from Ohio University Press, where this is Virginia's book. VIRGINIA HAMILTON, AMERICA'S STORYTELLER, is one of the series of biographies for young readers. It's an incredible series for any educators listening. It's wonderful. I think the initial goal was to highlight Ohioans that maybe hadn't really had a light shine on them. Virginia, there were some records written for her, but not really in this middle-grade, YA space that she wrote predominantly for. So, I thought it was very important to include her. I mean, you can't tell her story enough. But the format was driven by Ohio University Press. It was my choice, however, whatever topics that I wanted to include in those sidebars, as well as the "Did you know?" at the end of the chapter. For me, something that was relative within each chapter that I thought children, young people would find interesting, given the times that we live in now, and what the times were like. Then, as you say, like the phone numbers, even the comparison of Loving versus Virginia, with Blacks being able to marry Whites and vice versa, and how that was relative to the rights to engage, to marry. That made it relative to young people, that it was just really important for young people to understand the times, to learn a little bit, dive in a little bit more so into some of the topics that were touched upon within the text, to give them context.
Laura Maylene Walter (29:10):
Can you take us back to how you came to write this book for Ohio University Press?
Julie K. Rubini (29:17):
I had already written a book on Millie Benson, who is the original Nancy Drew ghost writer. It is the only biography of that, and knowing that, I wrote that title in a little different way -- more journalistically, because Millie was really a journalist and happened to write 135 children's books, in addition to twenty-three of the first Nancy Drew mystery stories. But I felt that it was really important to highlight women, Ohio women of note, and Ohio women writers. And I was aware of Virginia -- I knew of the Virginia Hamilton Conference for Multicultural Literature that had been staged at Kent State for a good number of years, but I had not been. Coincidentally, my husband and I sadly lost our oldest daughter, Claire, in 2000, and we chose to honor her love of reading by establishing a children's book festival. We felt it important to have a variety of authors and illustrators, to really be a diverse lineup of authors and illustrators. And so, I would often attend book festivals and events to meet, approach, invite, authors, illustrators to Claire's Day. And one of those individuals who was presenting at the Virginia Hamilton Conference is Angela Johnson. I reached out to her beforehand -- I didn't just show up. I introduced, and I told her our story. He always said, "Mutual admiration from the beginning with Angela." It didn't take much of anything to even get her to come, even though Angela doesn't drive. So, it didn't take much of anything to get Angela, who lives near Kent State, to come and visit us. I think Angela actually has been with us twice. So it was then at the Virginia Hamilton Conference that I really -- I mean, it was like the skies opened up and I was enlightened as to how significant Virginia was in the world of children's literature. And it just made me think that her story ought to be one of these serious biographies for young readers published by Ohio University Press, and true to form, with anything nonfiction, one is to submit a proposal. And in the case of an academic press, it is the Editorial Academic Board that reviews. So, it was fully approved. It was a dream for me -- from reaching out to Arnold and meeting with Arnold, to be in their home, to be in her office, to talking to family, talking to individuals at Kent State, to going to Kent State and seeing their archives there, to going to the Historical Society, to diving into Antioch. I mean, any one of my books, you can go to that back matter, and one could write their own separate -- in fact, my book on Virginia has already served as a resource. Nina Cruz wrote a beautiful picture book. EXTRAORDINARY MAGIC: THE STORYTELLING LIFE OF VIRGINIA HAMILTON is the title of her picture book, and she credits my research in helping to guide her in hers. And the same with Millie Benson is that I've received nice accolades from my writing, but also for my research. That is very important, especially to see and review and include information from primary documents: letters, communications, et cetera. They tell so much of the story.
Laura Maylene Walter (32:47):
So, Virginia Hamilton passed away in 2002. She had breast cancer. And I believe -- did Arnold Pass away in 2021? A few years ago?
Julie K. Rubini (32:57):
Yes.
Laura Maylene Walter (32:58):
He was a children's author as well. So can you tell us about your relationship with him, and how visiting him impacted your research for this book?
Julie K. Rubini (33:09):
You know, one tries to remain unbiased, I guess, as one researches one's subject, but it was difficult not to become a friend with Arnold right from the very beginning. He was so hospitable. He was so kind, generous with his time. He painted this vision of what their life was like as husband and wife, and as a family, from the marinara sauce bubbling in the kitchen while they're -- you know, I could just smell it. I make my own homemade marinara, so I got it. I understood that their day to day as writers, and checking in with each other, and reading to each other, and sharing with each other. I fell in love with both of them. I just loved their love, and I love their love story. Then, to have some communication with Jamie, I wish honestly that I'd had some more, and Lee lives over in Europe. But Arnold painted such an incredible picture of their family. There were some quotes from Jamie and Lee from the past that I included within the book, but it just sounded like a wonderful life as a family, as writers, the support of each other. He was truly a Renaissance man. He was so incredibly supportive of her, not jealous of her meteoric rise, always in support and her success is a lot in credit to that relationship with Arnold. Yes, being an author of children's works himself and being successful, and he was an anthologist, and he was a professor and a teacher, and he had his own workings going on, but all the while, he helped manage her and helped nurture her. And when I say "manage," I don't like the connotation of the word, because he was assisting her with contracts and with negotiations and things, just so that she could focus more on the creative work, and he took care of the business side. I met with him several times at their home. We had dinner at a nice restaurant. I have a great picture of the two of us from that night. He was kind enough to read the manuscript and gave his blessing, which was so important to me, because I thought, given his experience, given his relationship with Virginia, that this was very much his story as much as Virginia's, and I really wanted his approval and support, and he was very kind. He was the first phone call that I made when I learned about receiving the Kirkus Star review, and that I made when I learned that it made the Bank Street College of Education listing for outstanding merit. And he was so proud, and I think, tears. I mean, it was just joyful for both of us. So, I'm going to start to cry. I miss him.
Laura Maylene Walter (36:05):
He sounds wonderful, and it sounds that he and Virginia had a beautiful relationship. And I know their son, Jamie, is an author as well. I believe so. The legacy continues, for sure.
Julie K. Rubini (36:16):
He has a work that he's co-authored. It was a manuscript that his mother had. So, Jamie has two books coming out within the next couple of years, and we've had Jamie with us at Claire's Day, and I can't wait to have him back at Claire's Day again, once his other works come out. So, we're excited about that.
Laura Maylene Walter (36:31):
You mentioned your book, MISSING MILLIE BENSON: THE SECRET CASE OF THE NANCY DREW GHOST WRITER AND JOURNALIST, which actually does in a roundabout way have a connection to Virginia Hamilton, because she, apparently, I learned from your book, loved Nancy Drew books and Nancy Drew mysteries. At Page Count here, we're fans of Nancy Drew. We did an episode focusing on Mildred Benson. So, I think that sounds like a perfect subject for a book. So, I'll have to check that one out as well. But I am also curious. You mentioned Claire's Day, which is the festival you created in memory of your daughter. What a lovely way to pay tribute to someone, and that she loved reading, and you've created this wonderful event out of it. So, I'm wondering if you could share with listeners -- give us a peek into Claire's Day. What does it look like? It's in Northwest Ohio. What is typically featured at the event? And am I correct that the spring of 2026 will be its 25th anniversary? Is that correct?
Julie K. Rubini (37:32):
Absolutely correct. So, I'll tell you that the history, which again, brings us so full circle to me, that six months after we lost Claire, Brad and I felt compelled to honor Claire in a way that was true to her. We also felt compelled to honor relationships with each other as husband and wife, and with our two other children. And so I'm very blessed to say that we've received many awards, recognition, accolades for the work that we've done through Claire's Day. But to me, what's most significant is having those relationships with my husband, with two other children. And I can say that we're very happy, and we have amazing relationships. We're both very proud of that. But with Claire, at ten, she read high school level. So it was a challenge as a parent to find works that were content appropriate for her, but she also encouraged others in their journey, including my husband, who is dyslexic. And at night, when we would read, Claire recognized that he was switching out words, substituting words, doing all the creative things that that lovely brain of his would do in reading to compensate for what he was challenged with. So, six months after we lost Claire, we're on a flight to Jacksonville for my niece's wedding, and in my seat pocket is a Time magazine. I pick it up. I start flipping through. I see an article on the Texas Book Festival and former First Lady Laura Bush's involvement. And what really resonated with me was the fact that the Texas Book Festival features primarily Texas-born authors, illustrators, or those who have written about Texas. And since I had left my career in the hospitality industry -- marketing and sales management -- I was blessed to be able to be at home with the kids. But I was freelance writing, because I always loved to write, and I thought it was important that as we read the stories to the children, that they understood who wrote the words and who drew the pictures. So, I knew through that exercise that we had a wealth of talent in our backyard here in Ohio --Northwest Ohio, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana. So, I'm reading this article about the Texas Book Festival, and I start to cry. And six months out, a song -- anything -- can bring one to tears. I handed the article to Brad, and I said, "This is what we're going to do to honor Claire." And behind me is a letter on White House stationery from Laura Bush, who learned about our efforts from then-Governor First Lady, Hope Taft, about honoring our little reader gone too soon. Something incredible that we do, given this relationship with Brad and with Claire, and her encouragement of others, to encourage their love of reading and improve their reading skills, is that we give out to children chosen by their schools as the most improved readers. Not the best readers, but we give these children a personalized certificate. It's a C.A.R.E. Award, Claire's Award for Reading Excellence, as well as a coupon to choose their very own book from the authors and the illustrators at Claire's Day. We're not huge. We generally have about a dozen authors and illustrators, but we are no longer just a day. We have, still, the flagship Claire's Day is always the third Saturday in May in Maumee, Ohio, which is the community where we raised Claire and visited that library. It's on the grounds and inside the Maumee Branch Library. And then we have the first Saturday in May. We are now at the Toledo Main Library and celebrate young readers there. We started out -- 2002 was our very first Thursday, and we recognized maybe twenty-five young readers. We now average 1,200 children, and we have partnerships with almost forty schools who host our authors and illustrators, which is huge for the authors and illustrators, because they are getting paid their honorarium, whatever they command for an honorarium, for a full-day school visit or a half-day school visit. They're paid by the schools. And so, it's a win-win, because oftentimes we authors, you probably know this experience yourself as an author, is that the expectation is that you would go to a book festival. You're paying for your hotel. You're paying for your expenses. You have the opportunity to meet readers, and maybe, in my case as a children's book author, to meet teachers and educators, and therefore open up the possibilities of school visits. But you know, one has to make a living as well. And I think it's one of the very few industries that I'm aware of, that you're expected to do these things and not receive some kind of compensation. So we take care of our authors and illustrators. We host them for dinner the night before. We have a Claire's Night, very fun dinner, before Toledo. We take them out to dinner before Claire's Day in Maumee. We just really try and take care of them as best as we can. We have the school visit honorarium. Several of them get multiple school visits. So, it's all a very good thing. So yeah, Claire's Day is really kind of like two weeks, three weeks of literary experiences in Northwest Ohio, and it's just absolutely beautiful.
Laura Maylene Walter (42:35):
It's so fantastic. And you said it's not the biggest festival in terms of numbers of authors, but really, it doesn't have to be the biggest event in the state to make a huge impact in recognizing 1,200 readers. That's just amazing.
Julie K. Rubini (42:49):
These children are typically not receiving academic accolades. One of our longtime volunteers said to me last year, she said, "You know, it didn't really occur to me until this year is that these children don't know what this experience is like." Many of them are very shy, some of them are proud. But what I'm really impressed with is that family members in multiples come to support these children and they're clapping. It's like a big love fest, these C.A.R.E. Awards, and they happen all day long. So we have 1,200 children recognized. We've got forty school visits. We did the numbers. We impact now, annually, about 25,000 children and their families.
Laura Maylene Walter (43:28):
That's so impressive. I love it. I love it, and I love that this book, this Virginia Hamilton biography is representing Ohio at the National Book Festival on September 6th, everyone, in Washington, D.C. And I hear you'll be on hand to maybe sign some books, and to be there to keep completing that full circle experience of how this all came to be. And just happy to have you on the podcast. You are an Ohioan writing about an Ohio author, and you have created something quite special with Claire's Day, an Ohio book festival for children. So, it's just really perfect and fantastic. And I'm wondering before we go, is there anything you'd like to share with us about what you might be working on next, or what you hope to work on next?
Julie K. Rubini (44:16):
Thank you for asking. I've actually written my first middle-grade novel. I've had it in the hands of readers, some through SCBWI, which is such a great source, as you know, for writers and illustrators. And I have it in the hands of an editor acquaintance, so we'll hope to see what happens. It is a fictional account of our travels as a family, three years after we lost Claire, and our first major motor home trip out West in the eyes of the youngest, who our son was actually just nine at that time and our daughter, eleven, but I bumped their ages up. He's eleven and he both journals, as well as, it's from his first person perspective as to where this family is at three years after this loss, and where they're going literally, physically, and emotionally on their journey. And I have such high hopes. My kids have read it. I asked for their permission first. My kids have read it. My husband has read it. I've gotten some great feedback on it. So, knock on wood. I wanted to tell our story, somehow. And I think this would be a perfect way for kids who have experienced any significant loss to relate to. And it's very positive. There's a lot of humor, because we're all -- we deal with humor with all that we've had to deal with, and lots of adventures, and lots of learning experiences about this amazing country that we live in. So, fingers crossed. It was so fun when I told Trisha Springs stuff, who has been with us at Claire's Day a number of times, when I told her I wrote this middle-grade novel. She's like, "Well, it's about time."
Laura Maylene Walter (46:03):
I know Trisha. She's great. She'll be on the pod soon as well. And yes, I was thinking about her, actually, as you were talking, I was like, "I could see this being in conversation with Trisha's work in general." And yeah, I'm so excited for you. I love it. I love that you have embarked on middle-grade fiction, and I think Virginia Hamilton would like that as well. I think she'd be very pleased for you. Well, this has been so lovely. I so appreciate your time. I thought maybe I could end on a quote from Virginia Hamilton that was in your book, just tying up the Ohio loose ends of it all. So, she moved to New York when she was young, and of course it sounds like she had that typical young person point of view: "There's nothing for me in Yellow Springs. I have to get out of here and go to New York." And then, after ten or so years, she came back to Yellow Springs. So, this is Virginia Hamilton, having lived ten or more years in New York: "I discovered that my mind had never left Ohio. And so I returned to the river and the country. I could write. I had done it. I had pulled past and present memory and experience together and grown deep like the river." Thought that might be a nice note to end on. But Julie, thank you so much for being here and for sharing all this information about Virginia Hamilton, and Claire's Day, and beyond. We really appreciate it.
Julie K. Rubini (47:22):
Thank you so much.
Laura Maylene Walter (47:28):
Page Count is presented by the Ohio Center for the Book at Cleveland Public Library. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate, and leave a review for Page Count wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more online, or find the edited transcript for this episode at cpl.org/podcast/page-count. Follow us on Instagram at Ohio Center for the Book, or find us on Facebook. If you'd like to get in touch, email ohiocenterforthebook@cpl.org. Put "podcast" in the subject line. Thanks for listening, and we'll be back in two weeks for another chapter of Page Count.
