Author

Virginia Lee Burton

1909-1968 · American illustrator and author of children's picture books

About Virginia Lee Burton

Virginia Lee Burton (1909-1968) was an American illustrator and author, born in Newton Centre, Massachusetts, who studied art and dance in California and Boston. She married the sculptor George Demetrios and lived at Folly Cove in Gloucester, Massachusetts, where she led the Folly Cove Designers, a block-printing textile group. Her picture books include Choo Choo (1937), Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel (1939), The Little House (1942), Katy and the Big Snow (1943) and Life Story (1962).

Notable works

Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel (1939)
The Little House (1942)
Katy and the Big Snow (1943)
Choo Choo (1937)
Life Story (1962)

On this site

Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel

Virginia Lee Burton

1939 · Early 20th Century · Novella

Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel is a picture book about a man and the red steam shovel he names Mary Anne. Mike is proud of her and likes to say that she can dig in one day what a hundred men could dig in a week.

Technology Modernity Friendship Stoicism Endurance

The Little House

Virginia Lee Burton

1942 · Early 20th Century · Novella

The Little House is a picture book about a small pink house built by a man on a little hill far out in the country. He builds her strong and declares that she must never be sold, so that his descendants many generations on can live in her.

Home Exile Nature / Landscape Technology Modernity