Barbara Cohen was born on March 15, 1932. She grew up in New Jersey, where her mother ran a small hotel. Ms. Cohen attended Barnard College, and earned her MA from Rutgers University in 1957. While she raised her three daughters, she taught high school English, published a column, “Books and Things,” in New Jersey newspapers, and was active in civic and Jewish activities in her region.

She received the 1981 Sydney Taylor Body of Work Award from the Association of Jewish Libraries. She won two National Jewish Book Awards in 1983, for King of the Seventh Grade and Yussel’s Prayer, which was also an IBBY Children’s Choice Book.

She passed away at the age of 60 in 1992.

— Vicki Palmquist