it thoroughly!" Geisel himself was later critical of the book, saying on its 25th anniversary: "I think I was a little aloof, too outside there. It was written from the point of view of my mind, not the mind of a child". While Mulberry Streets sales grew significantly as the Dr. Seuss brand became more famous, it is not one of Geisel's best-selling books. In 2012, on the occasion of the book's 75th anniversary, Michael Winerip argued that later Dr. Seuss books were more entertaining and inventive than Mulberry Street but that it is nevertheless important as a harbinger of the many books that followed. A. O. Scott, in a 2000 article in The New York Times, contradicted this view, calling the book "a hymn to the generative power of fantasy, a celebration of the sheer inventive pleasure of spinning an ordinary event into 'a story that no one can beat'". Analysis Autobiographical elements and influences Some writers have focused on Mulberry Streets connections to elements of Geisel's life, particularly his childhood in Springfield, Massachusetts. Geisel probably named the street in his story after a real-life Mulberry Street in Springfield. However, Guy McLain, director of the Springfield Museum, contends that Geisel might have chosen the street mainly because of the sound and rhythm of its name. Lewis Nichols, writing in 1962 on the occasion of the book's 25th anniversary, largely confirmed this view, writing that in the book's creation "there was no particular Mulberry Street in view, although there was one of the name in Springfield, Mass., where Mr. Geisel was born, and the subconscious may have taken him back". Other writers have pointed out that the motorcycles the policemen use to escort the parade in Mulberry Street resemble Indian motorcycles, which were manufactured in Springfield during Geisel's childhood. Cori Urban claimed that the mayor in the story resembles Fordis C. Parker, who was mayor of Springfield from 1925 to 1929. Charles Cohen notes that, while the book mentions the intersection of Bliss and Mulberry Streets, their real-life counterparts in Springfield do not cross. Cohen connects the horse and wagon in Mulberry Street to Geisel's Springfield childhood and points to precursors of it in Geisel's earlier work. He traces the blue elephant in the book to the blue elephants that appear in Geisel's comic strip Hejji. Philip Nel acknowledges Mulberry Street as the start of Geisel's particular, distinctive verse style