Elvira Garner

Who was Elvira Garner?

Elvira Garner was a 20th-century Florida author and watercolor illustrator. Her best-known children's book Ezekiel, published by Henry Holt in 1937, detailed the story of a black boy who lived in Sanford, Florida with his Mammy, Pappy and sister Emancipation. Emblematic of Florida when it was part of the Deep South, Ezekiel was written in African-American dialect, it was popular in its time, but fell out of favor when books like Little Black Sambo were labeled racist. Now highly collected as an artifact of black Americana and African American fiction. Ezekiel's type was drawn, with illustrations inserted into the type.

In 1939, this Sanford, Florida native published Sarah Faith Anderson, Her Book, which detailed life in St. Augustine of a girl whose father was a missionary to the Seminoles, captured the feeling of 19th century Florida in words and illustrations. And in 1941, she published Way Down in Tennessee.

Her son is NASA scientist Douglas Garner.