Florence Parry Heide

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Florence Parry Heide is a bestselling American children's writer. Born and raised in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, she first studied at Wilson College in Philadelphia, PA. After two years, she then transferred to UCLA and graduated in 1939. She worked in advertising and public relations in New York City before returning to her hometown during World War II. She met her husband, Donald C. Heide, in October, 1943. They married six weeks later, on November 27, 1943.

After the war ended, she and her husband moved to Kenosha, Wisconsin. He began a private law practice, and worked until his retirement in 1982. She devoted herself to her children and began her career as a children's author only when the youngest of her children left for college in the late 1960s. She has since published more than 100 books for children and youth - from picture books to adolescent novels - and several collections of poetry. She also collaborated with Sylvia Van Clief to write a number of songs. Her best known works are a series of story books about the curious adventures of a boy named Treehorn, which includes titles such as The Shrinking of Treehorn (1971) and Treehorn's Treasure (1981). She has worked with renowned illustrators Edward Gorey and Jules Fieffer, and has won numerous awards for her work. She is the mother of authors Judith Heide Gilliland and Roxanne Heide Pierce, with whom she has co-written several other critically acclaimed books.

Florence Parry Heide was well known in Kenosha for the Fourth of July parade she organized each year: hundreds of children with their bikes decorated would gather outside her home and ride twice around her block to the beat of a drum. Although she has since moved, the parade continues each year in her honor.