author
Best remembered for early children’s books built around playful picture clues, this little-known writer also illustrated her own stories. Her surviving work has a warm, game-like style that feels made for young readers just learning to follow a tale on the page.

by Edith Francis Foster

by Edith Francis Foster
Edith Francis Foster was an American writer and illustrator of children's books. Sources available online consistently connect her with playful illustrated stories for children, including Mary's Little Lamb and Jimmy Crow, and note that her books were published through firms in Massachusetts.
Library and public-domain records show that she both wrote and illustrated her work. Mary's Little Lamb was published in 1903, and the Library of Congress record describes it as a picture-guessing story with hundreds of images by the author, which helps explain the lively, puzzle-like style associated with her books.
Not much biographical detail about her life appears to be widely documented in reliable public sources. What can be said with confidence is that her reputation today rests on a small body of illustrated children's books that have remained visible through library catalogs, Project Gutenberg, and volunteer archives such as LibriVox.