#snugglepot

Goodbye, little lion boy

On this day, 17th January 1877,  May Gibbs,  was born.

May Gibbs is considered one of  Australia’s most treasured illustrators, artists and children’s book authors.

Born Cecilia May Gibbs in England on 17 January 1877, she was the only daughter of artist, cartoonist and public servant Herbert William Gibbs and Cecilia Rogers. The family emigrated to Australia in 1881 aboard the Hesperus when May was four years of age. In Western Australia the young May spent many impressionable years observing the beauty of the Australian bush. Raised in a creative household, May demonstrated artistic ability from an early age, excelled at botanical drawings and in 1892  May won her first  Art prize at the Perth Wild Flower Show, the first of many throughout the 1890s. (Courtesy: About May Gibbs)

Gumnut Babies and Gum-Blossom Babies, the first of May Gibbs’ much-loved bush baby books were published in 1916. Two years later, Snugglepot and Cuddlepie: Their Adventures Wonderful, was published.

In 1919 she met Bertram Kelly and they married. They moved to Sydney  and built a Spanish-type house, Nutcote, on the shores of Neutral Bay surrounded by gum trees.  She pursued her career as an author and illustrator, publishing Little Ragged Blossom (1920) and Little Obelia (1921). Her gumnuts, blossom babies and bad 'banksia men' were to delight generations of children    (Australian Dictionary of Biography) 

Upon her death in 1969, at the age of 92, May Gibbs left all her works jointly to The NSW Society for Crippled Children (now known as Northcott) and the Spastic Centre of NSW (now known as Cerebral Palsy Alliance).                         In 1970 the two charities presented the May Gibbs archive to the State Library of NSW.

Images copyright - The Northcott Society  and Cerebral Palsy Alliance 2016