Later Childhood
It's difficult to describe the adult years of a man such as Dr. Seuss, who was so influencial to so many children. It is much easier to speak of him as never growing up, much like every individual who picks up one of his books. While he would have been turned 100 this year, the child inside everyone still sees Dr. Seuss as a young child, because no one else could think up the brilliance that he did. Seuss even claimed to write to please himself, recognizing the child in himself (MacDonald 1988).
After Ted left Oxford, he traveled Europe for a year, attempting to write the Great American Novel, as suggested by his Oxford friend Helen Palmer. When he returned to the United States in 1942, he married Palmer, who eventually became his manager, throughout his many endeavors, including the forming of the publishing company, Random House with its characteristic logo. They had no children, as Dr. Seuss would offen exclaim "you have 'em, I'll entertain 'em" as he believed he would have been a failure as an author, had he had his own child and always listened to her (MacDonald 1988).
Ted's first job came in the form of advertising for newspapers and magazines throughout New York City. He made his living as a cartoonist drawing political cartoons and advertisements for various businesses. His most well known and prosperous of the early jobs came from advertising for Standard Oil, with which Ted helped to familiarize the world with Flit, the pesticide. From this, Seuss coined the phrase 'Quick, Henry, the Flit!' and gave his characteristic images their beginnings (Seussville 2003).
While Seuss was still advertising for Standard Oil, he began to search for other options to further is career. While he was in a contract with Standard Oil that dissalowed any other advertising, Geisel's lawyer realized that children's books were not forbidden. Seuss began with his book And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street in 1937, and then continued on with his countless stories, that we all know so well (Philip 2004).
World War II did not pass Geisel by, even at his age of 38. He wrote numerous political cartoons for PM Magazine many of which were strongly biased and would be considered innapropriate in this day and age. He joined Frank Capra's Signal Corps in 1942 to produce movies to assist in the war effort. The signal corps realized that real soldiers made poor actors, and real actors made poor soldiers, so it was difficult to create informative videos for soldiers that still captured interest. It was here that Geisel learned the skills involved in animation and created the well known character 'Private SNAFU' to the delight and entertainment of all the enlisted men forced to watch his training videos. Two of his videos were even reproduced, and went on to win Academy Awards: Your Job in Germany to become Hitler Lives and Your Job in Japan to become Design For Death (Political 2004).
Geisel continued to write his books after the war and even through the 80's, writing his most famous books in the 50's, including The Cat in the Hat and Horton Hears a Who. More about the books of Dr. Seuss can be found here.