Ashely Bryan, an art activist for children, has passed away. He was 98 years old.

Ashley Bryan believed in the arts- music, painting, sketching, collaging, story telling- you name it, he believed in it. Furthermore, he was able to put himself into children shoes and write for them.

He knew his craft and delivered it well.

With so many people writing children book’s these days, it looks quite easy to write and illustrate a book for a child; however, when you view Ashley Bryan’s ‘Walk together Children’ or ‘Puppets Making Something from Everything’ or ‘Beautiful Blackbird’; you know children book making is more about craft than about circumstance, more about inspiration than about influence and more about realization than about repetition.

Ashley Bryan will continue to live on in classrooms and communities because of his deep appreciation of who he was and from whence he came.