Smile-inducing books were Carole Gerber’s forte
The prolific author, who also had experience as a journalist, delighted children and never met a stranger, her daughter says.
Popular children’s book author and journalist Carole Gerber ’75, ’78 MA loved meeting and learning about people of all ages. “She always had her interviewer’s hat on, and she never met a stranger she couldn’t talk to and make feel comfortable,” daughter Jess Abzug says.
The prolific author died on Dec. 12, 2024, at age 77. She wrote dozens of books, including textbooks and more than 20 picture books, early readers and chapter books that focused on nature, science, Christmas and Ohio. Her publishers included Henry Holt, Doubleday Books for Young Readers, HarperCollins and Charlesbridge.
Gerber’s final book, Venus Flytrap: Queen of the Meat-Eating Plants, will be published later this year or next. It will be edited by Gerber’s daughters, Abzug and Paige DeLacey. “It’s wonderful her book is coming out even when she’s not here and that her creative spirit lives on in this new book, and in all her books,” DeLacey says, adding that Gerber’s five grandchildren loved when “Mimi” read her works to them.
After earning her first degree from Ohio State, Gerber worked as a middle school and high school teacher in Columbus. She returned to campus to complete a master’s degree in journalism and, for the next several years, worked in a variety of writing- and journalism-related fields—editing, magazine writing, marketing and advertising—and as an adjunct professor of journalism at her alma mater.
“But her real goal was always to be a children’s book author,” Abzug says, adding that there were numerous rejections before her mother’s successful publishing career began. “She had such determination and perseverance.”
Gerber’s illustrated, fun-to-read books taught generations of young children about the world around them. “Her writing was musical and poetic,” says friend Linda Kass ’78 MA, who attended journalism school with Gerber. Kass is a published author, owner of Gramercy Books in Bexley, Ohio, and a former member of the Ohio State Board of Trustees.
Some of Gerber’s most popular books include The Twelve Days of Christmas in Ohio; Little Red Bat; Annie Jump Cannon, Astronomer; and Spring Blossoms. “I think her legacy is her many friends and her family,” Abzug says. “And leaving so many wonderful books for us to cherish and showing [her children and grandchildren] you can follow your dreams.”
