A Sad Day in Bear Country

Jan Berenstain half of the writing and illustrating team of Stan and Jan Berenstain, has passed away at age 88. She was preceded in death by husband Stan in 2005. Best known for their gentle, instructive Berenstain Bears stories, Stan and Jan sold over 250 million copies of 300 books in the 50 years since the first Berenstain Bears book, "The Big Honey Hunt," was published in 1962.

Jan is fondly remembered in articles by Michael Cavna , and Emily Langer of the Washington Post.

In an interview with Scholastic, the children’s magazine, Ms. Berenstain said she and her husband were always being asked why they had decided on bears rather than some other animal. Their standard answer was that “they stand on two legs, their mothers are very good mothers, and so on,” she said.

“One student asked why we didn’t use a fish,” she said, recounting a visit to a classroom. “And our answer was that they aren’t enough like people.”

Why not monkeys, then, asked another student.

“Because they are too much like people,” she replied. - NY Times, February 27, 2012

Stop by the tree house in Bear Country to spend a little time exploring. You can even send a letter to the bears to let them know how you feel.