September 20, 1950: Henry Huggins Moves Onto Klickitat Street

Today in 1950 · Wednesday, September 20, 1950

W. W. Denslow illustration from the first edition of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, 1900 — the American children's classic tradition Henry Huggins joined

W. W. Denslow illustration from the first edition of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, 1900 — the American children's classic tradition Henry Huggins joined · W. W. Denslow, 1900, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

In September 1950 — with the release date recorded by Kirkus as September 20 — the publisher William Morrow issued a first novel by a former children's librarian from Portland, Oregon. The book was 'Henry Huggins,' the author was Beverly Cleary, and American children's literature quietly changed course.

Cleary had worked the children's room long enough to know what was missing from its shelves: funny, ordinary stories about funny, ordinary kids — no castles, no ponies on the prairie, just a boy named Henry on a plain city street called Klickitat, who finds a skinny dog he names Ribsy and has to get him home on the bus. Kirkus reviewed it that fall; Louis Darling drew the pictures; first editions are now collectors' items.

From Henry's street would come an entire universe — most famously his neighbor's little sister, a girl named Ramona Quimby, who grew into the heroine of one of the best-loved series in the language. Cleary wrote into her nineties and died in 2021 at age 104, having sold over 90 million books. It started here, with a boy and a dog and a bus fare.

Also on this day

  • Both houses of Congress approved the final McCarran Internal Security Act, setting up Truman's veto two days later — and the override that followed.
  • The US Navy conducted Operation Sea-Spray, a secret biological-warfare simulation, spraying bacteria over San Francisco — revealed decades later.
  • US Marines crossed the Han River, opening the final assault on Seoul.

🎵 On the radio that week: America’s No. 1 song was “Goodnight Irene” by Gordon Jenkins and The Weavers (Billboard best sellers) — its 13 straight weeks at No. 1 was the longest run of the 1950s. That sound never really left — we recreate 1950s doo-wop and slow-dance ballads every week: read the stories behind our songs or listen on the lovesong1950s channel.
🎬 At the movies: “My Blue Heaven” held the nation's No. 1 spot for a second straight week, with “Sunset Boulevard” right behind at No. 2 (Variety).
⚾ In sports: The AL race was a dead heat for the ages — Yankees 90-53, Red Sox and Tigers both 89-53 — while the Phillies reached their high-water mark: 7.5 games clear with two weeks to play.

Sources: Kirkus: Henry Huggins review and release date · Raptis Rare Books: 1950 first edition · Wikipedia: September 1950 · Billboard best-seller charts, 1950 (issue scans) · Variety National Boxoffice Survey, 1950 (Lantern scans) · Retrosheet 1950 game logs and box scores. Every fact above is drawn from the records linked here — no dramatization, no invented details.

More from this series: Today in 1950 — the daily archive · every post from September 2026

More history from 1950

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