The School Library Journal recently featured Farmer’s Hat Productions in an article about the children’s book publishing scene in Minnesota. The article, titled: Land of 10,000 Publishers: Minnesota Children’s Book Publishing, dicusses the evolution of the industry throughout the state. Read the article below By Claire Kirch — School Library Journal, 3/1/2008

Minneapolis is a book lover’s paradise. There are dozens of neighborhood bookstores, a sleek new $125 million Minneapolis Central Library, and Open Book, the nation’s first facility devoted to the literary arts. No wonder it was dubbed America’s most literate city last year.

But one of the best-kept secrets is that Minneapolis and nearby Mankato have evolved over the past 75 years into major publishing hubs for the school and public library market. “[Minnesota publishers] are at the forefront in children’s nonfiction publishing,” says Wendy Woodfill, a children’s and young adult librarian at nearby Hennepin County Public Library. Susan Carr Brown, a children’s and teen librarian for Minneapolis Public Libraries, adds that local publishers do a great job supplementing the school curriculum and filling library shelves with rich information that kids need for classroom assignments and just pure fun.

Why has Minnesota become a mecca for this kind of niche publishing? Michelle Bayuk, marketing director for the Children’s Book Council, suspects that an entrepreneurial spirit, coupled with a strong book culture, contributed to the growth and expansion of this group of publishers. And books ranging from the disquieting Holocaust picture book Rose Blanche (Creative Editions, 2003) to the innovative The Titanic: An Interactive History Adventure (Capstone Press, 2007) have had educators and librarians buzzing at trade shows and poring over Web sites, catalogs, and review publications looking for more. Click here to continue reading the article

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