Spring Hermann

Spring Hermann was born and raised in Belleville, Illinois, across the Mississippi from St. Louis, where she won several national high school writing awards and edited the monthly newspaper. She studied theater design and dramatic literature at the University of Iowa and Indiana University, where she graduated. After marrying theater professor Vincent Gagliardi, Spring and Vincent went to Minnesota State University at Mankato where she designed all the production costumes. When Vincent was appointed to the theater faculty at Central Connecticut State University, Spring received her Master of Arts degree in literature there. By the time she graduated in 1971, she had Margo and Jessica, whom she raised by day, and taught in the theater department at night. Having never taken a writing course, Spring decided to enter the writing field.  Her first published novel in 1983 was a contemporary family saga. Spring worked for twenty years as a writer for non-profit organizations in Development and Public Relations. At the same time, she wrote adult subscription histories, novels, and biographies for young readers. Her novel Seeing Lessons is bio-historical, as each character is based on a real historical figure. Geronimo told the complete story of the Apache freedom fighter.  Anne Frank: Hope in the Shadows of the Holocaust, took Spring to Washington and Amsterdam for research. After The Struggle for Equality, Spring wrote A Student Guide to Tennessee Williams (Enslow) to aid high school drama and English classes in critically understanding the works of this great American playwright, while following the events of his life. A Student Guide to Eugene O'Neill will soon follow. The Masters: Slavery and the U.S. Presidency (G.P. Putnam's Sons) will study the lives and deeds of the first 18 presidents regarding slavery. This work is a first for young readers to focus on why racism became an imbedded fact in American society, and the role each of these Chief Executives played in making that happen.
  
Spring began writing for the theatre with A Working Heaven, which had workshop productions in 2001 and 2002.  This family musical portrays two Kentucky teens who join the Shakers and get caught up in the Civil War. A second youth musical called Abby's Light, with score by Stephen Murray, is based on her novel Seeing Lessons, the story of the first children in America to be educated who were blind. A finalist in two national competitions, it is awaiting its first professional production.  Spring is now working on a youth chapter book and a play based on the same material: the story of Milo, a seven-year-old boy who loves appliances. Milo and Popper is completely fictional.

The play Mama Tomcat's Flying Lessons was based on a novel called The Story of the Seagull and the Cat Who Taught her to Fly by Luis Sepulveda.  Spring loved the story which had so much humor and still helped young children to see the meaning of family and the struggle it takes each of us to grow up and find our destiny.  She was delighted to have Mama Tomcat receive its first workshop reading at the Bonderman Playwriting for Youth National Competition in 2007.  It is also the national winner in the New Plays for Youth Commissioning Project, at Central Washington University where it will be produced in January 2008.

You can visit Spring's web site here.