E-Mail: DavidLHarrison1@att.net
Welcome to my page. I’m David Harrison (1959). In 1982, Drury President John Moore created the post of Poet Laureate and appointed me to become the first poet to fill the position. I’m the only poet who has held the title. In July 2023, Missouri Governor Mike Parsons appointed me to a two-year term as Missouri Poet Laureate.
In Central High School, I met and fell in love with Sandy Kennon (1960). We were married in 1959, the same year I graduated from Drury with a major in biology and a minor in geology. I went on to earn a master’s degree in parasitology at Emory University in Atlanta. Sandy and I have two grown children: a daughter named Robin Williams and a son named Jeff Harrison.
In a writing course that I took at Drury during my senior year, Professor Clark Graham liked my work and urged me to consider becoming a writer. I’m leaving out the years of struggle that followed before my first book was published ten years later, a picture book that set my compass as a children’s writer. So far I’ve published 23 books of poetry, 44 books of fiction, 24 books of nonfiction, and 19books for classroom teachers.
I have a professional website that provides information about my career and a daily blog where I keep readers up to date on my life as a writer. On campus, the bookstore has or can get copies of my 2022 book, This Life: An Autobiography. It should also be available in Olin Library.
Here at Drury, I’ve had numerous occasions to contribute to campus activities — spoken to groups of students and faculty; co-authored a book about writing with Dr. Lauren Edmondson, a professor in the School of Education; presented to elementary, middle, and high school students visiting campus — but I also seek opportunities to represent my Alma Mater in positive ways with connections to literacy in general and poetry in particular.
State Poets Laureate are asked to write a poem about Missouri. I read mine for the first time in public in Stone Chapel during Drury’s 150th anniversary celebration. To learn more about my background as a poet, click on the button below marked “My Work as a Poet”.
Thank you for visiting my site. I try to keep it updated, so come back again.
—David
In May, 2026, I became involved in an effort to help raise reading comprehension and fluency in a group of approximately 3,000 3rd and 4th grade students in Limpopo, South Africa. I’ve joined forces with four professors from Missouri, Ohio, and North Carolina, taking turns addressing their teachers via Zoom sessions. This may be a two-year study with a research paper published with the results.
In June, I gave the closing talk at the annual state retreat in Jefferson City for Missouri Parents as Teachers Association (MOPATA). Later I revised the talk into an article that will be published this winter in literacy journals in California, Illinois, and Pennsylvania.
In July, Stenhouse Publishers brought out a book I co-authored with Dr. Mary Jo Fresch, professor emerita from The Ohio State University, called The Phonics Handbook Poetry Collection, 101 Decodable Poems for Reinforcing Sound Letter Patterns. I wrote the 101 poems.
In August, The Library Center in Springfield dedicated a room to me that is now called the David Harrison Story Hour Room.
In September, Holiday House published my 114th book. This is an illustrated poem for kindergarten students called Pumpkin on a Vine.
In October, my blog was named by FeedSpot as #66 among the Top 100 best children’s book blogs to follow and read in 2026.
