Sadie Rose Weilerstein (1894–1993)

Sadie Rose was born in the USA to Jewish immigrant parents from Lithuania. She attended the University of Rochester, in one of the first classes to admit women, and graduated with a bachelor's degree in English in 1917. She then taught in the high school for the deaf in Rochester. In 1921, she married Baruch Reuben Weilerstein, a rabbi, and had four children. After first living in Brooklyn, the couple moved to Atlantic City, New Jersey, where they remained for many years. Sadie Rose Weilerstein became an active rebbetzin (rabbi's wife), serving in a variety of volunteer and service roles. In telling stories to her children, she was inspired to create the now-famous Jewish hero K’tonton. His debut in Outlook Magazine in 1930 heralded the beginning of a new genre of children’s literature: stories for Jewish children written in English. The first book version of The Adventures of K’tonton was published in 1935. By 1964, Sadie Rose Weilerstein had written 11 books, which were translated into several languages and her stories can be found in many children’s anthologies. She was twice awarded the annual Juvenile Award of the Jewish Book Council of America.