Dr. Seuss is as popular as ever evidenced at his 112 birthday celebration at Redoubt Elementary where his birthday has been celebrated long after he died in 1991. Dr. Seuss was not an overnight sensation with his first book having been rejected 27 times before being published. Sharon Hale who coordinates the Read Across America Day at Redoubt every year says, “There are still a handful of people out there who don’t like Dr. Seuss books, but that certainly is not true of J.R. Edwards. Better known as the “Chip Guy” or the Lays Potato Chip delivery man, J.R walked into Redoubt Elementary last Wednesday, dying to read a Dr. Seuss book to someone. About then, he ran into a real life Cat in The Hat as I’m known each year. I was dressed as The Cat and was running around with several community members getting them settled in to read to different classes. Quite coincidentally, I happened to need one more reader and took him immediately to a first grade classroom. He was great, very enthusiastic and used all the different voices. Later on, as The Cat and JR was discussing their mutual love of Dr. Seuss books, he said his passion was so strong that ‘I even have the word SEUSS as the wording on my car’s License plate.’ And he also loves the Chicago Cubs,” laughed Hale. Every year, on March 2nd, Redoubt Elementary celebrates Dr. Seuss’s birthday says Hale, “My partner and I completely dress the part and the rest of the staff wears Cat in the Hat hats and ties. I start the morning by reading a page from a Dr Seuss book over morning announcements and classes call down to the office with their guesses. The winning guess gets a small prize for everyone in the class. We have guest readers from the community in and out all day. Our main goals are to promote a love of reading and for the kids to know that no matter what they choose to do in life, they will have to know how to read.”
Several community members came and went all day long, some reading a Dr. Seuss book, others reading one of their favorites. By the end of the day, every classroom had a guest reader who all represented different professions and parts of the community. “Although I was exhausted by the end of the day, it was a great day. People in this community are very generous with their time. They took part of their day from running the borough or running the school district to come over and spend some time demonstrating to our kids that reading is and always will be an important part of their lives. I would like to thank all of our readers for spending some of their valuable time with us and share the following quote from Dr. Seuss: ‘You’re never too old, too wacky, too wild, to pick up a book and read to a child.”
