Mountain Peaks

 

Stanley Lieber grew up in Manhattan, the son of Romanian/Jewish immigrants. He dreamed of writing the next great American novel, and he loved drawing cartoon characters. He wanted to reserve his birth name for use as a serious author, so he drew under a pen name. Ted Geisel was raised in Springfield, Massachusetts. His family owned a brewery until prohibition shut it down. In college, Ted was caught drinking. His punishment was to be banned from working on the school magazine, where he was editor-in-chief. He invented his own nom de plume to continue contributing stories and drawings. Stanley was drafted in 1942. He was slated to serve overseas. The Army quickly recognized his special skills and put him in the army’s Training Film Division unit, an elite group of eight men that included Ted. And that’s how Stan Lee of Marvel Comics and Dr. Seuss ended up working together, creating films to raise morale of combat troups.