Estelle Barnes Clapp
Laurie
Doubleday, Garden City, NY, 1953, illus Kurt Wiese
Reprinted in Grosset & Dunlap’s
Famous Horse Series
“Laurie wanted Fella so much that she was willing to get up at five in the morning
to feed him, knock herself out
of the loft pitching his hay, and practice riding until
she couldn’t sit down! A lot of work for a little girl, but Laurie
felt it was worth
it if she could earn the right to have Fella for her very own. This is a family
story, for Mother and
Dad, Tim and Donny as well as Ricky and the Slater tribe, play
a large part in the delightful saga of the conquest
of Fella. But Laurie, who steams
purposely past such pitfalls as fist fights and an inability to master simple
arithmetic,
has the first and last word. “
Estelle Barnes Clapp wrote just the one horse book: Laurie. Unusually for a book of its age, it tackles the themes of adult illiteracy and drunk driving.
She was, according to the dustjacket of Laurie, ‘an active believer in family living,
and has striven with great success to make LAURIE a family story. She has taught
dancing and physical education, raised a Tim and Laurie of her own, and done a great
deal of child-
Mrs. Clapp was born in Chicago and grew up in East Orange, New Jersey, with summer sojourns in Maine, where she “pulled lobster pots” with Robert Tristram Coffin’s brother, and now lives in Westport, Connecticut. Far from being an “ivory tower” writer, she admits ruefully that she composes equally well in her sunny dining room and a waiting room in Grand Central Station. As she explains, “If one wants to write, I believe one writes regardless of condition.”’
Finding the book: Laurie was not published in the UK. It’s readily available and reasonably priced in the USA in its Grosset and Dunlap incarnation, but is more expensive as the first edition.
Sources:
Laurie -
Many thanks to Susan Bourgeau for all her help with the pictures, the biographical information and the contents of the book.
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Estelle Barnes Clapp
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