By What most fans of the many Corduroy and Nate the Great titles illustrated by Jody Wheeler don’t realize is they represent but a small sampling of more than 75 books whose covers and inside pages showcase pictures by an artist whose fascination with children’s literature began prior to her kindergarten enrollment in the Ballston Spa Central School District.
When the Twin Towers collapsed near Jody Wheeler’s home studio in Manhattan on September 11, 2001, the self-proclaimed “City Mouse, Country Mouse” just happened to be working upstate and enjoying the fall foliage at a cottage on Brant Lake in the Adirondacks.
And when the drama of the “Miracle on the Hudson” emergency landing of a passenger airline by Captain Chelsey “Sully” Sullenburger was unfolding within view of her Big Apple windows on January 15, 2009, the BSHS Class of 1970 alum again just happened to be 200 miles north of the action.
But when Governor Andrew Cuomo issued shelter-in-place orders to NYC residents in an attempt to prevent the spread of the coronavirus on March 20, 2020, Wheeler had no way of escaping to the greener pastures of her beloved Ballston Spa hometown.
“In the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, I followed the tragedy on television while yearning to be within hugging distance of my NYC friends and neighbors during that time of profound sorrow and loss,” reflects Wheeler. After Sully landed the plane on the Hudson River, she was once again with her downstate loved ones in spirit as she watched the news coverage on an upstate TV.
“It had become a good-natured joke in my apartment complex near the Statue of Liberty that I had a secret way of knowing in advance that disaster was soon to strike and that I, therefore, always managed to get out of Dodge before it was too late,” says Wheeler. “Prior to the pandemic, when my doorman caught a glimpse of me departing with my suitcases, he’d quip: ‘Be afraid. Be very afraid. Jody has left the building.’ It wasn’t until my neighbors discovered I was still self-quarantining in the building during April, May and June that rumors of a crystal ball in my apartment stopped.”
By then Wheeler had been joining her locked down neighbors at seven o’clock each evening for social distancing festivities in windows and on balconies that ran the gamut from singing performances on stringed and wind instruments. In the absence of musical talent, Wheeler chose to ring an ancestral cowbell and to help a cherished Tickle Me Elmo doll wave to neighboring youngsters.
Unbeknownst to them, the nice lady with the Elmo doll’s workday was just beginning as they were being tucked into their beds. For it was then Wheeler would turn her undivided attention to a different beloved children’s character – Corduroy the Bear.
“I was creating illustrations for a pair of board books titled Happy Easter, Corduroy! and Merry Christmas, Corduroy! The hours just flew by when I was using my paintbrushes to help bring those stories to life for young readers,” beams Wheeler who two years earlier had been tapped by Penguin Random House LLC to illustrate Corduroy Takes a Bow by actress Viola Davis. The 2018 title Wheeler had illustrated honoring the 50th anniversary of the late Corduroy creator Don Freeman’s beloved teddy bear character had received glowing reviews. The applause had continued into 2019 as young readers discovered the then recently published Delacorte Press title Nate the Great and the Wandering Word (co-authored by Marjorie Weinman Sharmat and Andrew Sharmat.)
In between lifting the spirits of neighboring children from a distance with her furry red Elmo doll and creating pictures for the holiday-themed 2020 Corduroy titles, another highlight of Wheeler’s daily routine while quarantined was watching pandemic briefings by Cuomo while working out on her Nordictrack. “Just as former NYC Mayor Rudy Guiliani had been a reassuring presence in my life in the days, weeks and months following 9/11, I appreciated the informative televised briefings by Governor Cuomo. Those daily briefings did much to break the isolation. And since it wasn’t safe to go outside jogging as I’d done prior to the lockdown, I timed my Nordictrack workouts to coincide with the briefings. It ended up being a perfect fit,” says the former BSHS cheerleader whose mother Betty was a longtime Phys Ed teacher in the Ballston Spa Central School District.
“When I returned to NYC in the aftermath of 9/11, I had cobbled together a To Go bag in the event of some future catastrophe, as all New Yorkers were all encouraged to do. Ironically, although it included an N-95 air filtering mask like those worn by Ground Zero rescuers, I had no place to go after the State of Emergency was declared. You cannot outrun — or outsmart — a pandemic,” quips the artist who had originally thought the highlight of 2020 was going to be participating in the 50th reunion of the BSHS Class of 1970. (Spoiler alert: The COVID Crisis necessitated that plans for a huge celebration be put on hold.)
What most fans of the many Corduroy and Nate the Great titles illustrated by Jody Wheeler don’t realize is they represent but a small sampling of more than 75 books whose covers and inside pages showcase pictures by an artist whose fascination with children’s literature began prior to her kindergarten enrollment in the Ballston Spa Central School District.
“I definitely owe my lifelong love of books to my great aunt, Opal Wheeler, who was a prolific author of mid-century titles for young readers published by what was then called E. P. Dutton & Company, ” smiles Wheeler.
While her ability to breathe new life into books and products featuring Freeman’s Corduroy the Bear, Ludwig Bemelman’s Madeline, Ezra Jack Keats’ Roberto and some of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House characters speaks for itself, her original creations often hold sentimental value. The reason: Wheeler has been known to draw upon girlhood memories when creating artwork to accompany stories for young readers.
Indeed visions of Ballston Spa were among the first to dance in Wheeler’s head when she was commissioned to illustrate a special edition of The Night Before Christmas. Cherished childhood recollections additionally inspired some of the enchanting images inside of An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving by Louisa May Alcott and The First Noel. And at least one recent title (Happy Thanksgiving Day!) showcases paintings of characters that closely resemble a multi-generational family elsewhere in the foothills of the Adirondacks. (All four of these titles were published by Ideals Children’s Books.)
Whether illustrating books or creating original artwork for calendars, greeting cards, Keepsake Books, paper dolls or a diversity of other products, Wheeler does so “in the hope of touching the heart or sparking the imagination of the viewer. If I can bring a smile to a child’s face through a picture book … or help calm someone’s busy day with the soothing effect of a watercolor landscape or still life, I have done my job. And I do it because I truly believe that the visual arts have the power to inspire. I am thankful every day that I am so involved in illustration as a profession because it helps to foster literacy and and makes connections between us all.”
When recognized as an alumnus of distinction by the Ballston Spa Central School District in 2012, Wheeler was quick to award credit to the village educators who encouraged her earliest artistic efforts, insisting: “I don’t think I could have gotten a better education any place else; the teachers and principals I had at the old South Street School, Malta Avenue School and Ballston Spa High School were simply outstanding.”
Children's book illustratorCOVID-19Jody Wheeler
