You’re never too old, too wacky, too wild, to pick up a book & read to a child.

Quote Investigator traces the poem to Anita Merina circa 1997, after Dr. Seuss’s 1991 death. Its earliest dated publication located in this run is the 26 February 1998 revision of Mrs. Graybill’s WebQuest, known here only through Quote Investigator: its credit says Anita Merina, NEA Staff, October 1997. Quote Investigator also cites Gretchen Simpson’s 9 March 1998 Augusta Chronicle column, which prints the couplet within Merina’s poem and credits her. An advertisement in that newspaper on 2 March 2000 instead credits Theodor Geisel. Those early items were not independently inspected; they are secondary citations, not firsthand scans. The NEA page of 22 January 2021 supplies direct published confirmation of Merina’s authorship, with a revised opening and read with rather than read to. No exact original composition date or manuscript has been confirmed.

1. 26 February 1998Earliest found · credited to Anita MerinaMrs. Graybill’s Dr. Seuss WebQuest reproduces the poem with a credit to Anita Merina, NEA Staff, October 1997; earliest dated publication located in the research consulted, not a confirmed first composition.Mrs. Graybill, Dr. Seuss WebQuest: An Internet WebQuest on Dr. Seuss, last revised 26 February 1998. Checked on another researcher’s citation, not seen first-hand. Source
2. 9 March 1998Spread · credited to Anita MerinaGretchen Simpson prints the poem in an Augusta Chronicle guest column and credits Anita Merina, 1997.Gretchen Simpson, Guest Column: National event celebrated importance of reading, The Augusta Chronicle, 9 March 1998, p. 5A, column 1. Checked on another researcher’s citation, not seen first-hand. Source
3. 2 March 2000Credited to Dr. SeussA Newspapers in Education advertisement in The Augusta Chronicle prints the poem but credits Theodor Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss.NIE Newspapers in Education, Help Us Celebrate Read Across America Day And Read With A Child, advertisement, The Augusta Chronicle, 2 March 2000, p. 8A, column 5. Checked on another researcher’s citation, not seen first-hand. Source
4. 1 March 2018Reworded · credited to Anita MerinaThe Texas First Lady’s official page reproduces the revised opening couplet, using read with a child, and explicitly credits Anita Merina.Read Across America Day is March 2, Office of the Texas First Lady, 1 March 2018. Checked in a full-text transcription. Source
5. 22 January 2021Spread · credited to Anita MerinaThe NEA publishes its own Merina-credited version, with the quoted couplet opening the poem and with read with a child in the second line.Anita Merina, Read Across America Poem, National Education Association, 22 January 2021. Checked in a full-text transcription. Source

A couplet from a poem encouraging adults to read with children for the National Education Association’s Read Across America campaign. The campaign’s association with Dr. Seuss’s birthday helped put his name beside a poem credited to NEA staff member Anita Merina. The NEA’s own published version explicitly names and copyrights Merina.

No adult is disqualified by age, temperament or eccentricity from sharing a book with a child.

The Seuss-like rhyme and the campaign’s connection to his birthday are not evidence that he wrote it. The historical newspaper wording says read to a child, while the NEA’s current version says read with a child.

Kindness, Children, Wisdom, Education

• You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose.
• You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream. (misattributed) C. S. Lewis
• Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid. (not found) Albert Einstein
• You’ve gotta dance like there’s nobody watching, Love like you’ll never be hurt, Sing like there’s nobody listening, And live like it’s heaven on earth. (misattributed) William W. Purkey
• Learn to sell, learn to build. If you can do both, you will be unstoppable. Naval Ravikant

• quoteinvestigator.com/2014/11/16/read-child
• nea.org/resource-library/read-across-america-poem

“You’re never too old, too wacky, too wild, to pick up a book & read to a child.” Attributed to Dr. Seuss. No. Anita Merina wrote it, not Seuss. Quotogeny, https://quotogeny.com/q/youre-never-too-old-too-wacky-too-wild/ (checked 28 October 2026).

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