Eric Carle is an internationally bestselling and award-winning author and illustrator of books for very young children. He was born in New York, but spent his early life in Germany. He returned to the States in his early twenties and worked as a graphic designer for the New York Times. He went on to be the art director of an advertising agency before he began writing and illustrating children's books. Eric lives in Massachusetts with his wife, Barbara. The Carles opened The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Massachusetts in 2002. Bill Martin Jr, a former elementary school principal, and then teacher, writer and poet, held a doctoral degree in childhood education. His many books, among them bestselling classics Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? and Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear? are testament to his ability to speak directly to children. Born and raised in Kansas, Bill Martin Jr spent the last eleven years of his life in Texas, where he died in 2004.