Frances Clarke Sayers, 91; Author of Children’s Books

Frances Clarke Sayers, librarian, teacher and author who was known nationally for her efforts to improve the quality of children’s literature, has died at 91.

The former UCLA lecturer suffered a stroke and died Monday at her Ojai home.

Mrs. Sayers’ work, said Dorothy Anderson, an assistant professor at UCLA’s Graduate School of Library and Information Science, “changed the consciousness of several generations of people involved in children’s literature.”

Mrs. Sayers, known for her outspokenness, once even publicly chastised Walt Disney for making commercial use of children’s stories. She also warned librarians not to become “cherished Queen Bees and warm and comfortable fairy godmothers.”

She was the author of five children’s books, including the popular “Bluebonnets for Lucinda” (1934) and was co-editor of “The Anthology of Children’s Literature” (1958 and 1970.)

A graduate of the Carnegie Library School in Pittsburgh, she joined the New York Public Library in 1918 and served there until 1923 when she came to California and married. She was children’s librarian at the Los Angeles Public Library in 1923-24 and at University Elementary School in 1924-25. She also lectured at college and university library schools throughout the state.

She returned to the New York Public Library as superintendent of children’s literature in 1941, remained there until 1952 and then joined the UCLA Department of English as a lecturer in children’s literature.

When the UCLA School of Library Service opened in 1960, she was asked to join the faculty by founding Dean Lawrence Clark Powell. She retired in 1965.

In the forward to her “Summoned by Books: Essays and Speeches by Frances Clarke Sayers,” Powell wrote of her “gift of celebration, of stamina, scholarship and vision, the passion for people, especially young people, and for books, old and new. . . .”