Alice Dalgliesh - Biography

Biography

Born October 7, 1893 in Trinidad, British West Indies, to John and Alice (Haynes) Dalgliesh, Alice immigrated to England with her family when she was 13. Six years later she came to America to study kindergarten education at the Pratt Institute in New York City. She eventually received a Bachelor in Education and Master in English Literature from the Teachers College at Columbia University. While she was at school Dalgliesh applied for and received her naturalization as an American citizen. She taught for 17 years at the Horace Mann School, while also leading courses in children's literature and story writing at Columbia. Dalgliesh regularly wrote about children's books for Parent's Magazine (1929 to 1943), Publisher's Weekly, School Library Journal, and The Saturday Review. She also contributed to The Horn Book Magazine, including the article "In Mr. Newbery's Bookshop", about John Newbery.

Dalgliesh worked with the textbook department at Charles Scribner and Sons editing social studies books. This led to an invitation to start a children's book publishing department at the firm in 1934. According to Charles Scribner, Jr., at that time "Scribner's employed no women except secretaries. When she came to my father and asked him to give her an office, he replied, 'Oh, do you really need one?'" Apparently he had expected her to begin and run the division out of her home. She held the position of children's book editor until 1960.

After her retirement from Scribner's, Dalgleish became the editor of "Books for Young Readers" by The Saturday Review of Literature. She reviewed books for that magazine from 1961 until 1966.

Alice Dalgliesh died June 11, 1979 in Woodbury, Connecticut. Her papers are held at the University of Minnesota, Vassar College Library, and the Princeton University Library.