Though his father planned a business career for him, renowned illustrator Arthur Rackham worked in an insurance office for seven years while he attended art school at night and began to get established in the profession he had leaned toward since childhood. His legacy is a long list of highly regarded books, many classics among them--including Gulliver's Travels, Rip Van Winkle, and Peter Pan--graced with the imaginative illustrations that earned him critical acclaim and a wide following in his lifetime. After his death, Rackham's early works became collectors' treasures.

Rackham was born on September 19, 1867, in London, to Alfred Thomas Rackham, a civil servant, and Anne Stevenson Rackham. There were twelve children in the family; Rackham told The Junior Book of Authors that his boyhood "was spent in a noisy, merry, busy little community of work and play almost large enough to be independent of outside engagements."

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