Ellen MacGregor (May 15, 1906 – March 29, 1954) was an American children's writer. She is known best for the Miss Pickerell series of children's novels. Life She was born in Baltimore, Maryland, to George Malcolm MacGregor and Charlotte Genevieve Noble MacGregor. and was educated in schools in Garfield and Kent, Washington. She attended the University of Washington in Seattle, receiving a Bachelor of Science in library science in 1926. She did postgraduate work in science at the University of California, Berkeley. She worked in numerous libraries, wrote several well-received children's books and numerous magazine articles, and died in 1954 at the age of 47. Library career MacGregor worked in many jobs. She was a librarian for the elementary schools of the Central Hawaii School district and a cataloguer in the Hilo Library in Hawaii. She supervised the compilation of the Union Catalog of Art in Chicago and was a research librarian with International Harvester in Chicago, Illinois. She worked in Florida as a librarian at the Naval Operating Base in Key West, and organized and administered the library at the Naval Air Technical Training Center. She did research in children's literature for Scott, Foresman, and Company; served as the serials librarian of the Chicago Undergraduate Division of the University of Illinois; and was an editor of the Illinois Women's Press Association monthly bulletin, Pen Points. Writing career MacGregor began to write for publication in 1946. A story that she submitted at that time for a class at the Midwestern Writers Conference was later published as the book Tommy and the Telephone. The first appearance of Miss Pickerell, her famous and quirky major character, was in the short story "Swept her into Space", published in Liberty during 1950. She expanded it to book length, published in 1951 as Miss Pickerell Goes to Mars, a science fiction novel for children. MacGregor's goal was to provide fantasy literature with correct (for the time) scientific facts that would appeal to children. Miss Pickerell was well received by critics, such as Virginia Kirkus, who wrote: "A lively novelty. Fact and fancy in a new venture for this age group." It was also released as the initial selection of the new Weekly Reader Children's Book Club. Three other Miss Pickerell adventures followed before MacGregor's early death. Besides these books, many of MacGregor's stories appeared in magazines of that period, such as Story World, The Instructor,