Instead of saying good night to the things in her childhood room, in the dream it was her black telephone, lamp, and brush she bade good night. She wrote the story down as soon as she woke. Too impatient to wait for a typist, she called Ursula Nordstrom and read it to her. Ursula agreed it was almost perfect and decided to publish it.
Afraid of losing the visions in the dream, she included more notes than usual in the manuscript. She wanted the light in the room to subtly illuminate each object as it was mentioned. The entire room was to slowly dim as the story came to a close. The window was to be like her own, large enough to feel like the moon hung in the sky just for her. She chose a new title, more fitting with the way the moon loomed in her dream—Goodnight Moon. For both Margaret and Ursula, Clem was the logical choice as illustrator, but it would have to wait until he returned from the war.
Inspired by her neighbor, Margaret eventually painted her own apartment walls green and yellow. She also bought a red velvet cover for her antique poster bed, confessing to Michael her fear that the room would look like Christmas décor. But in the end, Margaret loved the bright colors of her revamped room.
Fifteen
1945–1946
In every book
At every film, I look
At the chorus or the star
I’m reminded of you
And of only you only and
That’s the way things are.
If I were now to die
I would be most happy
For I’ve never gone so far
As to love someone more
Than sun and the moon and star and
That’s the way things are.
“THAT’S THE WAY THINGS ARE”
White Freesias
As usual, Margaret spent her summer in Vinalhaven. She also went to Vermont for a week while Leonard stayed at the Only House, working on a story she wrote while looking out at the little island in front of her new home. When she came back, she found he had spent the entire time lying around and had not painted a single picture. At first, she was furious that he had wasted so many days. Then, as he painted, she realized he had been carefully studying the island. Like her, he had watched how the weather and waves created an ever-changing view of the tiny island to create stunning illustrations for The Little Island.
Other friends, too, came to visit the Only House. This time, they came ready to improve the little cabin. Dorothy Bennett, her Golden editor, added on a chimney and fireplace. Margaret watched her work, fascinated by the intensity with which her editor slung mortar and laid the bricks. For three days, Dorothy, her tongue held in the corner of her mouth, worked from morning until the last rays of the sun vanished from the sky to finish. Other friends helped Margaret construct a porch and build an outhouse. By the end of September, her house on the flowery hill was shaping up.
*
The world, too, seemed brighter. The war had ended, and by December, Margaret was in Cobble Court waiting for Clem and Posey to arrive from the airport on a snowy evening. Margaret’s valet, Pietro Ricci, had lit a good fire before he left and had stacked more wood neatly beside the fireplace. There was enough there to keep Clem and Posey warm through the night, and Pietro would return the next day with food and more fuel for the couple.
Clem’s tour of military duty in the South Pacific was over. He and Posey were returning from the West Coast and needed to find a new place to live. Margaret offered them Cobble Court as a temporary residence while they searched.
As Margaret waited for them to arrive from the airport, she admired her and Pietro’s handiwork. Pietro had worked for Michael’s son Robin for many years. After Robin’s death, Michael hired him to work for Margaret and herself. Pietro was born in Italy and, like Margaret, was fluent in French, so she nicknamed him “Pierre.” He walked the dogs, kept the apartments and Cobble Court clean, and could substitute as a cook if other household staff weren’t available.
Pietro had polished the interior brick floor of Cobble Court and Margaret the brass. She had spent two Christmas seasons working at Altman’s in their silver department and had come to love polishing silver and brass; it always gave her a sense of accomplishment. Her little living room glowed in the firelight.
Margaret would have Christmas dinner with her father later that month, but her mother was in poor health and living with Margaret’s brother, Gratz, in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Margaret would not be visiting there anytime soon. Whenever she thought about her mother, pangs of guilt struck. She regretted not visiting more often when her mother had lived in New York.
Margaret was very excited about the Hurds’ return. She’d kept in contact with Posey, and they had collaborated on a couple of Golden books, but nothing was better than working together in person. When the three of them were in one another’s company, they inspired each other.
Ursula made only a few changes from the penciled Goodnight Moon manuscript Margaret submitted. She didn’t keep the bit of humor Margaret added at the end in tiny script. She wanted a little drawing of the child saying good night to a cucumber and a fly.
Her draft listed the author as Memory Ambrose, a pen name she adopted from Bill Gaston’s housekeeper. She gave Clem the nom de plume “Hurricane Jones” after one of the islands near her house in Maine. Ursula deleted those noms de plume but kept Margaret’s title of Goodnight Moon.
*
The baby boom that followed the end of World War II brought with it the golden age of picture books. More sales meant publishers could afford new printing and manufacturing techniques. This inspired Margaret to think more broadly about what might be possible in book design. Pop-ups, die-cuts, shaped books, and novelty add-ons were a few of the ideas Margaret handcrafted in the dummy books she created to pitch to her publishers. She found a luminous paint that would glow in the dark and tried to get a printer to make an ink that would do the same on the pages of a book. That experiment didn’t work, but she painted stars on the ceiling of her apartment that glowed down on her as she slept.
Not only were books including novelties, but the marketing of books also stretched in new directions. Margaret and Leonard’s next book, Little Lost Lamb, came with a full-color poster that was suitable for framing. It was such a new concept that the publisher had to reassure buyers that the removal of the poster would not damage the book.
One of Margaret’s cleverest ideas was immediately picked up by Ursula for Harper. Margaret made a petite, hand-sewn book she called Little Fur Family and wrapped it in real rabbit fur. Garth Williams illustrated the fur-covered book that was placed into a slipcover box with a round hole to showcase the fur. Harper advertised it to the publishing trade as the year’s best book, and Publisher’s Weekly agreed, declaring that not since Pat the Bunny had there been a novelty book so novel. The retail price was $1.75, and a mink version was available on a limited basis for $15. Harper printed seventy-five thousand copies, and fortunately, parents and children found the book irresistible. Unfortunately, so did the moths in Harper’s warehouse. A vast portion of the inventory was ruined. The next edition was covered in faux fur.