Joanna Cole

Joanna Cole (August 11, 1944July 12, 2020) was an American author of children's books, best known as the author of the Magic School Bus series, which sold more than 93 million copies in 13 countries. She wrote more than 250 books, ranging from her first book Cockroaches to her famous series Magic School Bus, which is illustrated by Bruce Degen. Early life Cole was born in Newark, New Jersey, the daughter of Elizabeth (Reid), a homemaker, and Mario Basilea, a house painter. She grew up in the suburb East Orange. She loved science as a child, and had a teacher that she says acted a little like Ms. Frizzle, but that she did not resemble her physically because her teacher looked "very conservative". Her teacher let students check out one of her science books each week and Cole stated, "I thought that reading science books for pleasure was an ordinary thing". As a child, she studied insects and plants in her backyard. Cole enjoyed school and also enjoyed writing science reports for class. Her favorite book as a child was titled Bugs, Insects and Such which was a gift from her aunt because Cole liked to watch insects in her backyard. In 1965, she married Philip A. Cole. She attended the University of Massachusetts and Indiana University before graduating from the City College of New York in 1967 with a B.A. in psychology. Career After some graduate education courses, she became a librarian in a Brooklyn elementary school. Cole subsequently became a letters correspondent at Newsweek, then associate editor for the SeeSaw book club at Scholastic, and then a senior editor for Doubleday Books for Young Readers. She went freelance in 1980, writing children's books and articles for Parents magazine. Her first children's book was about cockroaches and it was published in 1971. Cole decided to write Cockroaches because there was not a book written about the insect at the time. She decided to write children's books full-time in 1980. Two of her books were written for parents to read with their children, with the titles being How You Were Born (1984) and Your New Potty (1989). Cole always kept the emotional level of her readers in mind when writing children's books. She stated that it is a privilege to have a career doing what she enjoyed as a child.