An Advent Calendar from Tasha Tudor (1978)

Unfolded, 5-panel, cardboard advent calendar with open-out, numbered cardboard windows. Text box in top right corner provides the title, An Advent Calendar from Tasha Tudor, in black text. Calendar features a winter woodland scene with various animals preparing food, walking or flying in the woods, and sleeping in beds. Central panel shows a sign above a tree (the tree has door in it) that says Lapin & Lapin Afternoon Teas, with a sign to the left labeled Menu and a sign to the right, above a bell, that says Please Ring.

Tasha Tudor (1915-2008) was an award-winning illustrator of fairy tales, classic children's books, and nursery rhymes. Though living in the twentieth century, both her illustration style and her lifestyle reflected a bygone age, namely the early Victorian era. She created stationery, illustrated books, and even knit or carved puppets and dolls for her own enjoyment. A woman of many talents, her work continues to enchant readers today.

Throughout the 1970s and 80s, Tudor produced several advent calendars in her signature style, featuring the Christmas celebrations of towns and villages filled with mice, rabbits, deer, and birds. An Advent Calendar from Tasha Tudor is one of the first she created, and it displays a wintry scene of preparation for the holiday with open-out cardboard windows that reveal additional woodland creatures going about their days. The calendars were available both as part of a book or as a standalone, fold-out calendar complete with illustrated mailing envelope, for sending to someone special. The standalone calendars retailed for roughly $3 at the time.

This calendar is part of the de Grummond Children's Literature Collection; it is an item from the Wm. John and Priscilla T. Hare (Tasha Tudor) Collection. It is one of several Tasha Tudor advent calendars in the collection, including one that pops up into a 3D village advent calendar. If you would like to view this or other items in the de Grummond Children's Literature Collection, stop by Special Collections in McCain Library, located between Cook Library and Hardy Street on the Hattiesburg campus. This calendar's call number is TT900.C4 T83 1978. You can find more Tudor materials in the Wm. John and Priscilla T. Hare (Tasha Tudor) Collection as well as the Harry Davis (Tasha Tudor) Collection. For more information, contact Ellen Ruffin at or Karlie Herndon at .

Text by Karlie Herndon, Assistant Curator, de Grummond Children's Literature Collection.