Ethel Jacobson

{{for|the New Zealand journalist and newspaper editor|Ethel Jacobson (editor)}}

Ethel Jacobson (1899Silvia Palmer Mudrick, Debora Richey, and Cathy Thomas, Fullerton: The Boom Years (Chicago: Arcadia, 2015), pp. 78–79. {{ISBN|978-1-62584-812-3}}. – 15 February 1991"[https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-02-17-mn-1982-story.html Ethel Jacobson; Author and Leader in the Arts in Orange County]", Los Angeles Times, 17 February 1991. Accessed 26 January 2023.Jennifer Moulton, "Ethel Jacobson, 91, internationally known OC poet, author of 6 books", Orange County Register (Santa Ana, California), 18 February 1991, p. 37. Via ProQuest.) was an American writer of light verse and a book reviewer.

Early life and education

Born Ethel Sonntag in Paterson, New Jersey,"Ethel Jacobson"; in Gale Literature: Contemporary Authors (Farmington Hills, Michigan: Gale, 2002). Gale in Context: Biography (accessed January 26, 2023). she was "brought up in New York City".

Jacobson studied at the Parsons School of Design, Syracuse University, Ohio Wesleyan University and the National Academy of Design: an education in art, music, and more – although not poetry.

Personal life

She married Louis John Jacobson in 1923; the couple had two daughters (described in December 1937 as thirteen and six years old)."Fullerton poetess gets it printed", The San Bernardino County Sun, 1 December 1937, p. 26. Via Newspapers.com. The family moved to Fullerton, California, in 1928. The couple summered in Mammoth Lakes, California. Jacobson enjoyed sketching and raising cats.

Jacobson died on 15 February 1991 in Fullerton, aged 91.

Career

Jacobson reviewed books (particularly nature-related booksMargaret Teague, "Talented light verse writer visits in city", Bartlesville, Okla. Examiner-Enterprise, 11 April 1962, p. 5. Via Newspapers.com.) for the Chicago Tribune, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and the Santa Ana Register.

From 1933For example, Ethel Jacobson, "Romance in Brief", The Saturday Evening Post, 29 April 1933, p. 22. Via EbscoHost. to 1978,Ethel Jacobson, "Public Nuisance", The Saturday Evening Post, December 1978, p. 84. Via EbscoHost. Jacobson contributed hundreds of poems to The Saturday Evening Post.This can be verified by a search for her name in EbscoHost. Other periodicals to which she contributed material included All-Story Love Stories,For example, "Parting", All-Story Love Stories, 27 June 1936, p. 102. Arizona Highways,Jacobson's contributions can be found in the Arizona Highways Online "[https://azmemory.azlibrary.gov/nodes/view/240 Collection search]", Arizona Memory Project. The Atlantic Monthly,[https://www.theatlantic.com/author/ethel-jacobson/ List of contributions], The Atlantic. The Author & Journalist,For example, "Subjects for verse", The Author & Journalist, November 1959, p. 21. Child Life,For example, "Stretching", Child Life, August–September 1961, p. 28 Collier's,For example, "Ungracious Hostess", Collier's, 4 December 1948, p. 77. Cosmopolitan,For example, "The Perfect Hostess's Perfect Child", Cosmopolitan, October 1951, p. 113. Fiction Parade and Golden Book Magazine,For example, "For a Prolix Author", Fiction Parade and Golden Book Magazine, September 1937, p. 560. Good Housekeeping,For example, "Hippo", [https://digital.library.cornell.edu/catalog/hearth6417403_1374_003 Good Housekeeping, March 1945], p. 42. Ladies' Home Journal,For example, "Silhouette", Ladies' Home Journal, January 1936. Life Story Magazine,For example, "Just Too Amusing", Life Story Magazine, June 1945, p. 19. Look,For example, "Ill-Seasoned", Look, 11 April 1961, p. 102. Liberty,For example, "Higher Arithmetic Comes to the Tax Department", Liberty, 1 March 1947. Love Book Magazine,For example, "Love Is Elusive", Love Book Magazine, January 1948, p. 19. Love Story Magazine,For example, "April Suitor", Love Story Magazine, August 1952, p. 5. McCall's,For example, "Babel", McCall's, July 1961, p. 112 New Love Magazine,For example, "May Walk", New Love Magazine, May 1953, p. 77. The New York Times,For example, "Water Snake"; in Thomas Lask, ed., The New York Times Book of Verse (New York: Macmillan, 1970), pp. 188–189. ("All poems in this volume originally appeared in The New York Times.") Redbook,For example, "Well?", Redbook, June 1930, p. 30. and The Wall Street Journal.For example, "Banquet Speaker"; in Charles Preston, ed., The Light Touch: Verse, Epigrams, Aphorisms and Jokes selected from the Pepper ... and Salt column of The Wall Street Journal (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1965), p. 25.

She also wrote poems that regularly appeared within syndicated pot-pourris: "Cook-coos, by Ted Cook""Cook-coos" was from the King Features Syndicate; it appeared in The San Francisco Examiner. Many examples can be seen at Newspapers.com. and "Contract highlights, by Z. V. Smith"."Contract highlights" appeared in The Redwood Journal (Ukiah, California). Many examples can be seen at Newspapers.com (which anachronistically labels pre-1954 issues the Ukiah Daily Journal).

Jacobson wrote many poems about her dog Rover. Later, she turned to writing poems about her cats.Peggy Powell, "Laughter – fore and after: Life fun to Ethel Jacobson", The Independent (Pasadena, California), 2 February 1962, p. 11. Also published as: Peggy Powell, "Laughter – fore and after: Life mostly fun to Ethel Jacobson", Star-News (Pasadena, California), 2 February 1962, pp. 19, 27. Both via the Newspaper Archive. In 1972, she was quoted as saying "I've always been bats about cats", but described as working on a book about squirrels.Wanda Lund, "Develop own style, Utah writers hear", Deseret News (Salt Lake City), 11 September 1972, p. 10A. Via Newspapers.com.

In 1937, Jacobson described herself as having a comfortable income from poetry, which she enjoyed writing, and as having refused offers of contracts to write dialogue for movies.

Identifying "the battle of the sexes" as "that richest of mother lodes for the light verse writer out prospecting for subject matter", the poet Richard Armour named Jacobson as one of the women – together with Dorothy Parker, Phyllis McGinley, Margaret Fishback, and Georgie Starbuck Galbraith – who had "done even better" at this than had the men.Richard Armour, Writing Light Verse and Prose Humor (Boston: Writer, 1971), p. 28. {{ISBN|0-87116-064-1}}.

What has been described as Jacobson's most frequently quoted verse has a darker subject:

To smash the simple atom

All mankind was intent,

Now any day

The atom may

Return the compliment.Titled "Atomic Courtesy", it has appeared in print in such diverse publications as:

The Clark Panther (Clark College, Atlanta), November 1954, p. 2. (At Newspaper Archive.)

The Times Recorder (Zanesville, Ohio), 17 January 1960, p. 4. (At Newspaper Archive.)

The Drumheller Mail, 23 June 1976, p. 8. (At Newspaper Archive.)

Sara Brewton and John E. Brewton, eds., Shrieks at Midnight: Macabre Poems, Eerie and Humorous (New York: Crowell, 1969), p. 63. {{ISBN|0-690-73518-9}}.

P. Edward Ernest, ed., The Family Album of Favorite Poems (New York: Grosset and Dunlap, 1959), p. 216. {{ISBN|0-448-01279-0}}.

William L. Masterton and Cecile N. Hurley, Chemistry: Principles and Reactions (Fort Worth, Texas: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1989), p. 131. {{ISBN|0-03-053028-8}}.

(Jacobson used the term "dark verse".)

On rare occasion, Jacobson would also write serious verse.For example, "Born, Feb. 22", appearing within Lee Shippey, "Lee side o' L.A.", Los Angeles Times, 21 February 1942, p. 20.

Jacobson's first collection of light verse, Larks in My Hair, won high praise from its reviewer in Deseret News: "a wonderful bargain – more grins and laughs for the money than in many a more widely publicized book of humor"O. W. B. (i.e. Olive W. Burt), "Volume of light verse pokes fun at foibles", Deseret News (Salt Lake City, Utah), 29 June 1952, p. 37. Via Newspapers.com. In his review for the Los Angeles Daily News, Richard Armour too praised this "bright little book", saying that:

Of the general school of Dorothy Parker and Margaret Fishback, this writer specializes in the battle of the sexes, household pets (she is the light verse laureate on cats and dogs) and children.

Richard Armour, "Poet deals with battle of the sexes", Daily News (Los Angeles), 14 June 1952, p. 8. Via Newspapers.com.

The reviewer for Deseret News of Jacobson's third collection, I'll Go Quietly, described it as "on a par with" its predecessors, but gentler: "The same wit is here, but, perhaps a little softened".Olive W. Burt, "'I'll Go Quietly' new, delightful", Deseret News (Salt Lake City, Utah), 23 November 1966, p. 9. Via Newspapers.com.

Curious Cats (1969) was the first of two books to combine photographs by Florence Harrison and text by Jacobson. It won a very favorable review in The Sun-Telegram for its "really remarkable pictures of cats-in-action, all ages" and the humor and "good 'sound' [that should make it] fun to read aloud to children".Virginia Brasier, "Verse, camera take visit to 'Curious Cats'", The Sun-Telegram (San Bernardino), 23 November 1969, p. C{{nbh}}13. Via Newspapers.com (which labels the newspaper The San Bernardino Sun). The reviewer for the Arizona Republic also enjoyed it: "it was lucky for the rest of us ailurophiles that [Harrison and Jacobson] happened to meet and decide to collaborate".Gladys T. Niehuis, "Cats on coffee tables", The Arizona Republic, 12 July 1970. Via Newspapers.com.

In The Cats of Sea-Cliff Castle (1972), Jacobson wrote in prose. The reviewer for The Sun-Telegram called the book "a literary and photographic work of art", in its depiction of "a haven for a colony of abandoned cats".Virginia Brasier, "Book about abandoned cats is 'work of art'", The Sun-Telegram (San Bernardino), 9 April 1972, p. D{{nbh}}13. Via Newspapers.com (which labels the newspaper The San Bernardino Sun). The reviewer for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram wrote that Jacobson "[provided] a poetic minimum of text for one of the most appealing picture books possible".Florene Cooter, "Cats' home is seacoast castle", Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 28 May 1972, p. 7{{nbh}}I. Via Newspapers.com.

Books by Jacobson

Larks in My Hair. Placentia, California: Courier Press, 1952. {{OCLC|5928550}}. (Poetry collection, 103 pp.; illustrated by Jacobson; with a foreword by Richard Armour)
Mice in the Ink. Brea, California: Progress Press, 1955. {{OCLC|4815420}}. (Poetry collection, illustrated by Jacobson, 93 pp.)
Diamonds for Your Jubilee. Santa Ana, California: Charles W. Bowers Memorial Museum and the Orange County Historical Society, 1964. {{OCLC|22784688}}. Commemorative publication, 12 pp.)
I'll Go Quietly. Dallas: Triangle Press, 1966. {{OCLC|5906016}}. (Poetry collection, 71 pp.)
Curious Cats. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1969. {{OCLC|1029022866}}. (Poetry and prose accompanying photographs by Florence Harrison.)
Who, Me? Dallas: Triangle Press, 1970. {{OCLC|5909938}}. (Poetry collection, 69 pp.)
The Cats of Sea-Cliff Castle. [Los Angeles]: Ward Ritchie, 1972. {{ISBN|0-378-60253-5}}. (Accompanying photographs by Florence Harrison; about the homeless cats of the area of Corona del Mar.)

Ethel Jacobson

Early life and education

Personal life

Career

Books by Jacobson

Notes

References