# Is "Frederick" by Leo Lionni a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Frederick by Leo Lionni (Pantheon, 1967) is identified by: Pantheon, New York, 1967. US precedes.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- Pantheon, New York, 1967
- The copyright page of the first printing carries seven lines, opening "© Copyright, 1967, by Leo Lionni" and including the Library of Congress card number "AC 66-10355"
- Boards are white/ivory cloth (ivory per Bauman, white per the Children's Picturebook Price Guide), the front board bearing a small frontal image of Frederick and the rear board a small image of Frederick from behind; printed endpapers
- The jacket should be present and priced (price present at the front flap, unclipped); the rear jacket panel of the first printing lacks the Library of Congress card number, and the rear flap carries a short Lionni biography followed by reviews of Swimmy and Tico and the Golden Wings
- A copy whose rear jacket panel bears the LC card number, or whose copyright page departs from the seven-line setting, does not match the first-printing description
- Note: a "9/66" jacket flap code circulates in search-engine summaries of this title but does not appear in the Children's Picturebook Price Guide entry itself and is not treated as a point here
- Publisher imprint reads Pantheon

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Leo Lionni |
| Publisher | Pantheon |
| Year | 1967 |
| True first | US edition |
| Format | Children's / illustrated |
| Key point | Pantheon, New York, 1967 |
| Book-club edition exists? | No |

## Points of issue
Pantheon, New York, 1967. Quarto. The copyright page of the first printing carries seven lines, opening "© Copyright, 1967, by Leo Lionni" and including the Library of Congress card number "AC 66-10355". Boards are white/ivory cloth (ivory per Bauman, white per the Children's Picturebook Price Guide), the front board bearing a small frontal image of Frederick and the rear board a small image of Frederick from behind; printed endpapers. The jacket should be present and priced (price present at the front flap, unclipped); the rear jacket panel of the first printing lacks the Library of Congress card number, and the rear flap carries a short Lionni biography followed by reviews of Swimmy and Tico and the Golden Wings. A copy whose rear jacket panel bears the LC card number, or whose copyright page departs from the seven-line setting, does not match the first-printing description. Note: a "9/66" jacket flap code circulates in search-engine summaries of this title but does not appear in the Children's Picturebook Price Guide entry itself and is not treated as a point here.

## Is this the true first?
US precedes. Pantheon, New York, 1967 is the true first; a 1968 Caldecott Honor Book and a New York Times Best Illustrated Children's Book for 1967. Lionni followed his editor Fabio Coen from Obolensky to Pantheon, which is why the titles from Swimmy (1963) onward are Pantheon rather than Obolensky/Astor books. German-language editions — Frederick is heavily collected in Germany — are translations postdating the New York first, not the original. Later Knopf and Dragonfly Books reissues are reprints.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
No book-club issue documented in the sources consulted for this title. The Children's Picturebook Price Guide entry does not distinguish later printings beyond the copyright-page and jacket points above, so identification rests on the seven-line copyright page with "AC 66-10355", the white/ivory boards with the two small Frederick images, and a rear jacket panel free of the LC card number. Later Knopf/Dragonfly reissues and the Scholastic printings are reprints.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Frederick* by Leo Lionni a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/frederick
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.