Children's Literature Sites to Get You Started

Childrens Literature Web Guide, David Brown, University of Calgary. A comprehensive site on children's books with many links.
Carol Hurst's Children's Literature Site. Especially useful for teachers.
Vandergrift's Children's Literature Page, Rutgers University. A large collection of scholarly resources on children's literature. Especially see Traditional Literature - Social History.
Fairrosa Cyber Library of Children's Literature. Created by an experienced children's librarian. Many author links.

Library Collections of Rare Children's Books

Library of Congress. About 60 important rare children's books that you can view page by page. Children's books are scattered throughout the LC special collections, and thus there is little organized information on this site.
The Cotsen Collection at Princeton University recently donated and endowed to serve children and researchers both. An interesting site.
The de Grummond Collection of Children's Literature, University of Mississippi A very large collection, well explained. Kind of what you would expect of the Library of Congress.
Children's Literature Research Collections, University of Minnesota. Includes several special collections, OZ, Paul Bunyan, Treasure Island, and also the Kerlan Collection, a research collection with children's literature in manuscript.
Your Old Books. American Library Association. A guide from the Rare Book and Manuscript Selection of the ALA answering your questions about acquiring, collecting, maintaining, selling, and donating rare books.

Purchasing New Books
First try your local, independent bookstore...look for an independent bookseller through Book Sense Books,from the American Bookseller's Association, with 1200 stores listed. You can select Children's specialist bookstores near you or find those with websites. You'll talk to booksellers who will care about books and children! Most offer comparable prices to A, B,and B&N.

Recommended Journals Online
These journals maintain online sites now as well, but the actual printed journals contain much more information. Contact the online site or the 800 number for subscription information.

Bookbird
The journal of IBBY, The International Board on Books for Young People, published in English by the University of Toronto. Current books reviewed, conference information. Articles on international children's books by genre and culture, which are very hard to find elsewhere. Very interesting. Subscribe online.

The Horn Book
The Horn Book's History Pagecontains Barbara Bader's articles and 75 year retrospective. A grand old publication, started by the "foremothers" of the field of children's literature in this country. Contains reviews of current books, along with many retrospective articles of interest to the collector. Look for old issues. In most libraries. 1-800-325-1170.

If your interest is contemporary fiction in the United States you will also want to look at:
CBBC, The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books.

Recommended Booksearchers
We are always happy to help you identify books and to look through our unentered stock. However, since we do not perform formal searches, I asked Jeryl Metz if I could recommend her service. You will benefit from her many years of experience with children's books and booksellers.

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