Corbin, William

Eloise Jarvis McGraw, the only child of Geneviece Lucinda and Loy Hamilton Jarvis, was born on December 9, 1915 in Houston, Texas. Eloise's family moved to Oklahoma City when she was five years old. From an early age Eloise expressed an interest in writing. At age eight, inspired by the gift of a cedar pencil, she wrote a story entitled "The Cedar Pencil Boys". Her story drew upon the magical adventures she read about in Frank Baum's Oz series. Eloise believed that young authors would always emulate the authors they read, so it would become important to her, as an author, to give children quality material to imitate.

Eloise attended Classen High School in Oklahoma City where she graduated in 1933. She continued her education at Principia College in Elsah, Illinois. Eloise majored in art, but she had a wide range of interests that included playing hockey, writing poetry, and singing in the glee club. Eloise earned her A.B. degree in 1937 and decided to return to Oklahoma. For the next three years she pursued a variety of interests. She painted murals and portraits, attended some graduate classes at the University of Oklahoma and the University of Colorado at Boulder, studied modern dance in her spare time, and even worked in radio, broadcasting children's plays.

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