Getting fired at the age of 15 from her first job as a part-time assistant at the local library — for
spending too much time reading! — never dampened Kathleen Krull’s love for books. In fact, her
termination produced determination: to create books that meant as much to others as they did to her.
Krull, ’74, made good on her promise and today is an award-winning author of books for young people, with more than 50 fiction and nonfiction titles to her credit (www.kathleenkrull.com). One of six alumni honored at the June 18 Reunion Convocation, she was presented with the 2005 Lucia R. Briggs Distinguished Achievement Award. Named in honor of the second president of Milwaukee-Downer College, the Briggs Award recognizes alumni more than 15 years out of Lawrence for outstanding contributions to and achievements in a career field.
After graduating from Lawrence with a degree in English, Krull began her career in a variety of staff and editorial positions for several different publishers and, by 1984, had turned to writing full-time, establishing herself as an accomplished children’s author. Her 1980 book, Sometimes My Mom Drinks Too Much, written under the pseudonym Kevin Kenny, earned awards from the Chicago Book Clinic, the Children’s Book Council, and the National Council for Social Studies.
She also has explored the famous and the accomplished through a series of award-winning “Lives of” books, in which she has profiled musicians, athletes, artists, presidents, and extraordinary women. The series has earned numerous honors, including Smithsonian magazine’s “Notable Books for Children,” the New York Public Library’s “100 Titles for Reading and Sharing,” and an International Reading Association Teacher’s Choice Award.
Lawrence Today magazine, Fall 2005