author
Sarah J. Burke
Known for helping shape children’s reading in the late 19th century, this little-known writer is associated with simple, lively books for young readers. Her surviving work suggests a talent for adapting educational and entertaining material into a form children could enjoy.
1 Audiobook
P. T. Barnum's Menagerie
by P. T. (Phineas Taylor) Barnum, Sarah J. Burke
About the author
Sarah J. Burke appears to have been an author and adapter of children’s books in the late 1800s. Sources connected to public-domain library records credit her with Fairy Tales for Little Readers and with P. T. Barnum’s Menagerie, a children’s book arranged with P. T. Barnum.
Because reliable biographical information about her is scarce, not much can be confirmed about her life beyond her published work. What does come through is her role in creating or shaping reading material for children at a time when short moral tales, fairy stories, and illustrated educational books were especially popular.
Today, her name survives mainly through catalog records and digitized editions, which preserve a small but intriguing piece of children’s literary history.