Bill Brittain, a former Lawrence teacher and award-winning writer, dies at 81

Award-winning writer and former Lawrence School District English teacher and reading specialist Bill Brittain died on Dec. 16. He was 81.

Brittain wrote more than 70 mystery stories that were published in Alfred Hitchcock and Ellery Queen magazines. He also wrote 13 children’s books, one of which earned him a Newbery Medal, which is awarded annually by the Association for Library Service to Children for the most renowned American children’s book published each year. He also won several state awards in Connecticut, Arkansas and Nevada.

Brittain grew up in Spencerport in upstate New York before graduating from the State University of New York at Brockport and receiving his master’s in Education at Hofstra University.

He taught eighth grade for a few years at the Number One School in Lawrence, which was on Central Avenue, before spending the next 32 years at Lawrence Middle School where he taught English. He later became a reading specialist and retired in 1988.

He and his wife, Virginia, retired to Asheville, N.C. where Brittain was a teacher at the University of North Carolina at Asheville’s Center for Creative Retirement from 1993 to 2010. His teaching focused on the works and lives of authors Edgar Allan Poe and Alfred Hitchcock, among others.

Aside from his love of teaching and writing, Brittain and his wife traveled extensively across the United States and Europe after he retired. According to Virginia, they visited London several times and it was their favorite destination.

Brittain is survived by Virginia, and their children Jim and Susan.