What Is the Great American Picture Book?

The most American thing to do with the question is to vote on it.

We’re within two months of America’s 250^th birthday, and the countdown is on!

There are lots of possible answers to the question what does it mean to be an American? but one basic answer is we like to vote. So let’s vote: Is there an all-time greatest American picture book?

Huck Finn is often cited as The Great American Novel (though it got voted out pretty early in Hannah Elizabeth’s recent poll). But what about The Great American Picture Book?

I asked last week for nominations, and several dozen of you wrote back. I took those suggestions, added my own, and built a list of sixteen possible contenders for the honor. (I almost said, “the title,” but the Constitution doesn’t permit titles of nobility, so let’s go for a different word.)

We’ve got beloved authors like Robert McCloskey and Virginia Lee Burton, and contemporaries like Jan Brett and Kevin Henkes. There are time-tested classics such as Miss Rumphius and Corduroy. Dr. Seuss is represented alongside Arnold Nobel. America has produced some pretty great authors and illustrators.

Now to the polls!

I spent far too long trying to think of some way to model the vote on the Electoral College, or at least the Major League Baseball play-offs, but they’re just too clunky for this purpose. And since basketball was invented at the YMCA, perhaps you actually can’t get more American than to use a Sweet 16-style bracket.

Come back next week for round two! In the meantime, leave a comment making the case for why your favorite book is the best.