Guest Author - Holly Fox

Cute Knut, the Berlin zoo’s polar bear cub is hardly the first resident of a German zoo to become an international sensation. You might think that good old Curious George is a native of Africa but in fact he, as well as his creators H.A. and Margret Rey, originally came from Hamburg, Germany.

H.A. Rey was born Hans Augusto Reyersbach in 1898 and grew up near Hamburg’s zoo, the Hagenbeck Tierpark (in yet another case of the German language’s precision, “Tierpark” literally means “animal park”). He spent his youth sketching in that park before heading to Rio de Janeiro to make his fortune. There he reunited with Margarete Elisabeth Waldstein, also a Jew from Hamburg, who had studied art and photography and had come to Brazil to escape the mounting anti-Semitism in their home country. They married in 1935 and after an enchanting honeymoon in Europe, they settled in Paris.

There they began writing and illustrating children’s books together and in 1939 published “Raffy and the Nine Monkeys”. The youngest of the nine monkeys was a curious, mischievous little monkey drawn from memories of the monkey at the Hagenbeck Tierpark and Margret and Hans began a book just about him called “The Adventures of Fifi”. They received an advance from their French publishing company for the story which would prove fortuitous. As the German army marched into France they looked for a way to escape.

Hans built bicycles for the couple and they fled the French capital on early June 14th, 1940. The Nazis entered the city just hours later. They rode their bicycles for days and when they reached the French-Spanish border they sold the bicycles for the train fare through Spain and on to Lisbon, Portugal. They had become Brazilian citizens after their wedding and were now able to return to Rio de Janeiro. They arrived with little else than several of their manuscripts, including the Fifi story. They sailed for New York and began to rebuild their lives. Fifi was considered a rather effeminate name to the American ear and he was rechristened George. A year later “Curious George” was published by Houghton Mifflin. The couple would go on to write seven other Curious George adventures: “Curious George Takes a Job”, “Curious George Rides a Bike”, “Curious George Gets a Medal”, “Curious George Flies a Kite”, “Curious George Learns the Alphabet”, and “Curious George Goes to the Hospital”.