By Julia Parmley
Everybody knows Disney is the place where dreams come true. So in 1979, GW alumna Susan Amerikaner flew from Baltimore to Southern California to try and land her dream job as a children’s writer for Disney Publishing Worldwide.
A former elementary school teacher, Ms. Amerikaner was working as an advertising copy writer but wanted to pursue a career that combined her two greatest passions: writing and children. “Like most people, I grew up with Disney, and I wanted to work for the best.”
So Ms. Amerikaner wrote a letter to the Walt Disney Company asking if they had any openings in their educational media division. The company, which is the world’s largest publisher of children’s books and magazines, wrote back saying they didn’t but encouraged her to drop by if she was ever in town. Ms. Amerikaner says she picked a date on her calendar, told Disney, and flew out to their offices in Burbank, Calif.
“I was young and fearless then,” she says. “When I arrived, I was so thrilled to be on their main street, Dopey Drive.”
Staff told Ms. Amerikaner that although they did now have an opening, they were unable to hire her until she met the company president, who was unfortunately out of town. Interpreting this as a brush off, a brokenhearted Ms. Amerikaner “cried all the way back on the plane” and was entering her apartment when her phone rang—with the president on the other end.
As luck would have it, he was in D.C. and asked Ms. Amerikaner to meet with him. “I did and moved out to California shortly after.”
In her 30 years at Disney, Ms. Amerikaner has published more than 200 books and scripts featuring an assortment of characters, including Mickey Mouse, Goofy and the Disney princesses. Ms. Amerikaner also created the Gifted and Talented Workbooks, the first “thinking skills” books for young children.
Ms. Amerikaner joined Disney at the inception of its Disney Channel, and she got involved in numerous television projects, including Adventures in Wonderland, which earned her a Writer’s Guild of America Award for Outstanding Children’s Script. This Disney start in television opened the door to more TV writing assignments for a variety of companies in addition to Disney, including PBS. She also received acclaim for her animated episodes of The Adventures of Madeline, which received numerous Emmy nominations for outstanding children’s series. Her resume is an eclectic mix. She’s written for The Weird Al Show, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and Bite Size, a television series about healthy eating and cooking.
“Everything I do has an educational component, because that’s what I do best; it puts together all my skills, and I enjoy the challenge,” says Ms. Amerikaner. “I’m a 6-year-old at heart.”
Ms. Amerikaner is currently working on a set of new educational books about Winnie the Pooh, the Disney princesses and a fairy world called Pixie Hollow. Before she begins each assignment, Ms. Amerikaner studies the characters on film and on the page and pins up color illustrations of each character around her office. She researches intensely, she says, so she can adapt the character’s speech and attitude in her writing. “I really need to hear the characters’ voices in my head,” Amerikaner said.
“When I receive an assignment, I’m told the age of the target audience, how many words per page and a general theme or topic. But the story itself is up to me,” says Ms. Amerikaner. “I also have to work with the illustrators to plan out the details of each scene. I never get over the thrill of seeing a finished book. It’s beautiful.”
Ms. Amerikaner credits her love of education to her time at GW’s Graduate School of Education and Human Development, where she received a master of arts in teaching in 1972. Ms. Amerikaner praised the small class sizes and relationships she made with her classmates. “It was a fabulous program, and I learned so many things about education and teaching,” says Ms. Amerikaner.
Some of those lessons are still ingrained in Ms. Amerikaner’s mind. She recalls Professor Emerita Gloria Horrworth’s practice of writing the title, author and illustrator on the chalkboard before she read aloud a story and of greeting each student by name as lessons she will never forget.
“Professor Horrworth taught us a respect for literature and a reverence for children’s literature in particular,” says Ms. Amerikaner. “This was important to me, because literature was in my heart.”
The past 30 years have truly been “a delight” for Ms. Amerikaner, who says students interested in writing should ask for help, build professional relationships and “never give up” — because you may just land your dream job.
“Mickey Mouse has been good to me,” says Mrs. Amerikaner. “He brought me to California and changed my life. I wished upon a star, and I got it!”