Julia Child

Julia Child 1912-2004, American cooking teacher, author, and television personality, b. Pasadena, Calif., as Julia Carolyn McWilliams. She learned French cooking while her husband was in the diplomatic service in France during the late 1940s. In 1961, Child, Simone Beck, and Louisette Bertholle wrote the now-classic Mastering the Art of French Cooking, the first practical and comparatively accessible such cookbook for an American audience. Shortly thereafter, she began hosting a series of educational television programs; the best known, The French Chef (1963-76), transformed her into an Emmy-winning public-broadcasting star. Child's comfortable, off-hand manner took the intimidating quality out of preparing French cuisine and helped to change American styles of cooking and eating as well as American attidudes toward food. Her many other cookbooks include From Julia Child's Kitchen (1975) and The Way to Cook (1989). Child's kitchen was dismantled and permanently installed in the Smithsonian Institution.

Bibliography: See her My Life in France (2006, with A. Prud'homme); biographies by N. R. Fitch (1997) and L. Shapiro (2007); N. V. Barr, Backstage with Julia (2007).