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Author Norman Bridwell and his wife, Norma, pose for a portrait in 2011. The creator of the Clifford the Big Red Dog stories passed away Friday at age 86.
Charles Sykes/AP
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Charles Sykes/AP
Author Norman Bridwell and his wife, Norma, pose for a portrait in 2011. The creator of the Clifford the Big Red Dog stories passed away Friday at age 86.
Charles Sykes/AP
More than 50 years after he came up with a story about Clifford the Big Red Dog, artist and author Norman Bridwell has died. In 2012, Bridwell told NPR he was shocked when his idea was accepted for publication.
A native of Indiana, Bridwell was 86. He died Friday on the Massachusetts island of Martha’s Vineyard, where he had long lived with his wife, Norma.
No cause of death has yet been released, but the AP reports that the author had been in the hospital since falling down at home several weeks ago. He had also suffered from prostate cancer, his wife tells the news agency.
“He passed peacefully with family members at his bedside,” the AP reports, citing Norma Bridwell.
It was Norma Bridwell who told the budding children’s book author that his idea to call a huge bloodhound “Tiny” was “stupid,” as he recalled when he and his wife spoke with NPR’s Scott Simon. Instead, they decided the dog should be named Clifford, after an imaginary friend Norma Bridwell had when she was little.
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Article source: http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/12/16/371293645/-clifford-the-big-red-dog-creator-bridwell-dies-at-86?utm_medium=RSS&utm_campaign=news