Knickerbocker Award for Juvenile Literature
Contact
Chair, Tara Thibault-Edmonds ✉️Â
Vote for the 2025 winner!
To assist with your nomination, here is a partial list of authors and illustrators living in New York State.
Nominations are due by June 1st of each year.
In 1991, NYLA/SSL established the Knickerbocker Award for Juvenile Literature. It recognizes a New York State author who has demonstrated, through a body of work, a consistently superior quality which supports the curriculum and the educational goals of New York State Schools.The award is named for a group of 19th century New York State authors who wished to nurture a national literature. It is presented annually to a living author/illustrator currently residing in New York State.
Tiffany and Company designed the crystal award for which Beverly Choltco Devlin designed the graphic. NYLA/SSL members may nominate a New York State author or illustrator by submitting this form, filled out in its entirety, to the Knickerbocker Award Chairperson by March 31st of a given year.
Nominated authors will be placed on an electronic ballot, with voting by NYLA/SSL members to be held that May. The nomination form must accompany all nominations to be accepted for this vote.
This is your opportunity not only to help recognize an outstanding author/illustrator, but also to help choose the banquet speaker for the NYLA/SSL Spring Conference!
2023 Winner Rita Williams-Garcia
2023
Rita Williams-Garcia
2022
Andrea Davis Pinkney
2021
Bryan Collier
2020
Kate Messner
2019
Tamora Pierce
2018
Steve Sheinkin
2017
Gordon Korman
2016
Patricia McCormick
2015
Steve Kellogg
2014
Doreen Cronin
2013
Jacqueline Woodson
2012
Emily Arnold McCully
2011
Linda Sue Park
2010
Laurie Halse Anderson
2009
David Adler
2008
Richard Peck
2007
Jerry Pinkney
2006
Leo & Diane Dillon
2005
Margery Facklam
2004
Jennifer Armstrong
2003
Thomas Locker
2002
Bernard Waber
2001
Harry & Norma Fox Mazer
2000
Mary Jane Auch
1999
M. E. Kerr
1998
Cynthia DeFelice
1997
Bruce Coville
1996
Joseph Bruchac
1995
Robert Kimmel Smith
1994
Seymour Simon
1993
Russell Freedman
1992
Jean Fritz
1991
Jean Craighead George