Virginia Hamilton
(1936–2002)
Virginia Hamilton was born in Yellow Springs, Ohio, where her family has deep roots. Hamilton's grandfather, Levi Perry, had been enslaved in Virginia and escaped to Yellow Springs using the network of personal contacts and hiding places known as the Underground Railroad. Hamilton’s grandmother, who was of African American and Cherokee heritage, was from Yellow Springs. Virginia Hamilton herself was named for the state of Virginia, where her grandfather had lived more than seventy years before.
Surrounded by a large and loving family, on a farm in the countryside, Hamilton enjoyed a happy childhood. She excelled in her studies and was a self-proclaimed teacher’s pet. There were always books and magazines in the Hamilton house, as well as stories from "Grandpa" Perry, who often would tell the family about what it was like to escape from slavery. When Hamilton became a writer, stories like these inspired her and became the basis for The People Could Fly: American Black Folktales, as well as Many Thousand Gone: African Americans from Slavery to Freedom.
Early on, Hamilton began to write her own stories. In college, she majored in literature, first attending Antioch College in Yellow Springs and then transferring to Ohio State University. While studying fiction writing at the New School for Social Research in New York City, she met poet Arnold Adoff. They married and moved with their two children back to Yellow Springs—to the land and the stories that had been in Hamilton's family for generations.
Her first book to be published was Zeely. With more than thirty books published in three decades, she proved to be a writer with whom readers can grow up. She wrote for a variety of age groups, from preschool to young adult, and in many genres, from picture books to short stories to full-length novels. She also was a writer for all reading tastes, from reality-based fiction to fantasy, mystery, science fiction, biography, and folk tales. She enjoyed writing historical mysteries like The House of Dies Drear as much as contemporary stories like The Planet of Junior Brown.
Writers of books for young adults rarely receive the acclaim that Virginia Hamilton did. M.C. Higgins, the Great is the first work in history to win both the National Book Award and the John Newbery Medal. In 1992, the International Board on Books for Young People gave Hamilton the Hans Christian Andersen Award for her lifetime contribution to children’s literature.
No matter what the genre or audience, and no matter how prestigious the award, Virginia Hamilton continued to write about what was close to her heart—people whose passion for their heritage will preserve a culture for generations to come.
