Michael Brown (writer)

For other people of the same name, see Michael Brown (disambiguation).

Michael Brown (born 14 December 1920 in Mexia, Texas) is a producer and writer of songs and books. Of his books, the most widely known are several children's stories about Santa Mouse.

Brown has served several terms as a member of the board of the Songwriters Guild of America.

Industrial musical career

Excerpts from "The Woolworth Manager's Work Song":

The buyer told you what was new,
Then he assigned you quite a few.
Your total sales were only two:
Don't blame the buyer...it was you!
...
Shrinkage, watch out for shrinkage,
or else the one that ends up shrinking there

will probably be you.

Starting in 1953, he produced industrial musicals for corporate clients in the United States and other countries. His biggest production was DuPont's multi-million-dollar Wonderful World of Chemistry at the 1964 New York World's Fair. Brown wrote, produced, and directed a musical involving interaction between live performers and life-sized actors on film. In over 17,000 performances it was seen by over 5.2 million people.

Another example of his corporate work is an industrial musical revue for Woolworth performed in June 1965 called Mr. Woolworth Had a Notion.

Broadway songs

His first work on Broadway was the song "Lizzie Borden" in Leonard Sillman's New Faces of 1952.

Writing with Harold Arlen, he wrote "Indoor Girl" sung by Pearl Bailey in House of Flowers and then by himself created the score for the English musical Is There Intelligent Life on Earth?. He also wrote a production number for the Carol Channing company of Sugar Babies and the book, music, and lyrics for the nineteen-day run of Different Times.

Brown is married to Joy Williams Brown, a former ballerina. The couple was instrumental in the career of Harper Lee, making it possible for her to write To Kill a Mockingbird by giving her the gift of a years' wages in 1956 with the note: "You have one year off from your job to write whatever you please. Merry Christmas."

Santa Mouse bibliography

These have been reprinted under various ISBNs

• Santa Mouse (1966, ISBN 0-448-10215-3)
• Santa Mouse Meets Marmaduke (1969, ISBN 0-448-01859-4); note that this Marmaduke is a mouse and not the comic strip dog of the same name
• Santa Mouse, Where Are You (1968, ISBN 0-448-19109-1)
• Santa Mouse Treasury (1970, ISBN 0-448-34280-4)

External links

• Entry on Internet Broadway Database website
• John Murray Anderson's Almanac, a fan's website
• The Wonderful World of Chemistry at The Internet Archive.

Persondata
Name	Brown, Michael
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	14 December 1920
Place of birth
Date of death
Place of death