The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. It’s a movie that you and I know well. It’s also one that will forever be a part of our childhood memories.
And this Sunday marks the day the book the movie is based on turns 120 years old.
And while we know the two main characters of the story well, Dorothy and Toto … what most people don’t know is that the man who wrote it started his career as a chicken farmer.
Yep … a chicken farmer.Image may be NSFW.
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Lyman Frank Baum was born on May 15, 1856 to a well-to-do family in Syracuse, New York. And although financially he didn’t have much to worry about, he wasn’t blessed with good health.
He had a weak heart and instead of enjoying ordinary outdoor childhood activities, he stayed mostly indoors.
Lyman passed the hours inside his house reading books or adding to his stamp collection.
The only real outdoor activity he participated in was hanging around the chickens on his parents’ estate.
As for schooling, his parents enrolled him in a nearby military academy.
But with health issues, it was a struggle for him to keep up with the physical duties and requirements.
So Lyman decided to pursue his interest in chickens instead.
Chickens to the Wizard of Oz
He began breeding chickens and became something of an expert on the Hamburg variety, which he later wrote about in a book.
Since Layman enjoyed writing, his father him bought a small, inexpensive printing press.
Lyman used the press to publish a family newspaper, writing on all kinds of family related topics.
This marked the start of his writing career.
As he grew older, he took up writing plays. That led him to a job as manager of the town’s local theater. Of course being the manager affords one certain privileges and for Lyman, he could now produce plays he wrote.
Many of the plays he wrote and produced were as magical and mysterious as The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
For instance his play The Maid of Arran drew a regular audience. So Lyman decided to take it on the road, touring different cities.
Being a playwright was now his chosen profession. And he would have stuck with if the hometown theater hadn’t burned down. All of his work … including the costumes, props and scripts went up in smoke.
But he didn’t give up …
With His Wife’s Encouragement
While he looked around for an alternative career, he met and married Maud Gage in 1882. The couple moved to Chicago where they started a family and eventually had four sons.
With a family to feed, Lyman took a job selling China at a local store. It’s a job he hated but was much needed in order to care of his family.
But he never lost his love for stories. At night when putting his children to sleep, he told bedtime stories.
Those stories were full of twists and turn, with vivid characters just like the ones in The Wizard of Oz. Characters that he bought to life will silly facial gestures and wildly animated arm gestures.
With the encouragement of his wife and mother-in-law, Frank started writing these bedtime stories down on paper. He then took his newly penned stories to different publishers hoping get them published.
But each try was met with rejection.
Finally Success Achieved
On his last try, one publisher decided to give Lyman a chance. His first story, Mother Goose in Prose was published in 1897.
It was successful enough that Lyman was given a chance to write a sequel, Father Goose, His Book. In fact that book was one of the best selling picture books of 1899-1900.
Lyman now found is true calling as a children’s book author. And of course, his most well known achievement was writing The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, which was published in 1900. (And now we celebrate 120 years of Oz.)
The first print run of the book was 10,000 copies, which sold out in just eight months. From then on, OZ was a fantasy world every family grew to love.
In fact Lyman wrote 14 different Oz related stories. But all things no matter how well liked eventually fade from our minds.
And over the years, Lyman’s Oz became a distant memory until it was adapted for the big screen. The Wizard of Oz was released in 1939 and was huge Hollywood hit.
But Lyman didn’t live long enough to see his beloved OZ on the big screen.
Over the years, his health continued to decline. And at the age of 62, he underwent gall bladder surgery in 1918.
He spent the last year of his life confined in bed, never fully recovering from the operation. Just days before his birthday, Lyman Frank Baum died on May 6, 1919.
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