Picture book
In 1938, the American Library Association (ALA) began presenting annually the Caldecott Medal to the most distinguished children's book illustration published in the year. The Caldecott Medal was established as a sister award to the ALA's Newbery Medal, which was awarded to a children's books "for the most distinguished American children's book published the previous year" and presented annually beginning in 1922. During the mid-forties to early fifties, honorees included Marcia Brown, Barbara Cooney, Roger Duvoisin, Berta and Elmer Hader, Robert Lawson, Robert McCloskey, Dr. Seuss, Maurice Sendak, Ingri and Edgar Parin d'Aulaire, Leo Politi, Tasha Tudor, and Leonard Weisgard.
Caldecott Foundation
The Caldecott Comminuty began its life in 1911 when Leila Rendel and her friend Phyllis Potter set up their own nursery school based on the progressive ideas of Margaret McMillan and Leila's aunt Edith Rendel who was an active critic of the English Poor Laws, a pioneer girls' club leader and a militant suffragist. Their school was located at Cartwright Gardens in St Pancras and mainly catered to the children of women working in a nearby matchbox factory. An admirer of Randolph Caldecott's children's book illustrations, Rendel named the nursery school in his honour and adorned its walls with a frieze of his pictures. Rendel's grandfather, Alexander Meadows Rendel, provided them with an endowment and further donations were received from her large circle of family and friends. By 1914 the school was well-established with a written constitution and Percy Nunn as its chairman. Princess Louise served as its president.