Who Is Lyman Frank Baum?

Lyman Frank Baum was born in Chittenango, New York to Benjamin Ward Baum and Cynthia Stanton in 1856. While young Lyman spent his youth reading, rewriting, and selling classic fairytales to friends intertwined with his own dark twists, his father was making a fortune in the Pennsylvania oil rush. During Lyman’s adolescence, his father purchased him a printing press, which lead to the young writer’s creation of the Rose Lawn Home Journal, which included his own articles, editorials, fiction, and poetry. Before becoming an author of children’s books, Baum continued to pursue journalism and, after his father built him a theater in 1880, he focused on playwriting. In 1899, Father Goose, His Book, Baum’s first top-selling children’s book, was
In 1900, Baum introduced the vibrant Land of Oz to children across America. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, the story of a misplaced farm girl and her adventures with unlikely friends became a hit and later an American classic (bibliography.com 1). Many readers, however, began to find parallels between the iconic tale and recent political events, particularly the Populist and Free Silver movements. Baum had always been politically involved in his life, especially when he helped with Populist campaigns. Despite the allegations, Baum insisted, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was written solely to pleasure children today. It aspires to being a modernized fairy tale, in which the wonderment and joy are retained and the heartaches and nightmares are left out” (online-literature.com 4). In 1964, Henry Littlefield published The Wizard of Oz: A Parable on Populism, providing an overwhelming amount of evidence to contradict Baum and resparking the discussion of his rhetoric throughout the tale. L. Frank Baum uses allegory and symbolism in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz to illustrate the political, economic, and social events of late