Sesame Street Books 1971 - present

Last updated: Sept 15, 2022 

A sample of Sesame Street storybooks.

It's an insane thing to attempt, but for this page of the blog my goal is to photograph and document every single Sesame Street book that I own, and there are a lot! It will take quite a while before this page is finished, so keep checking back to see what has been added. My collection of Sesame books is just an itty-bitty sample of what has been published. Actually, I suspect that there are so many Sesame Street books in the world today that they could fill an entire library. Wouldn't THAT be a cool place to visit! Okay, enough stalling, here I go.... yikes!

The Monster at the End of this Book, 1971-present

Of course, I have to start this page with a genuine classic! Above left is a 1977 oversized edition of "The Monster at the End of this Book" by Western Publishing / Golden Books. Next to it is a smaller 1999 "Jellybean Books" edition by Random House (center), and an even smaller Western Publishing/Golden Books edition (far right). All three are hardcovers, the Super Grover figure is for size reference. This book has been reprinted in numerous formats and sizes for the last 50 years, so that today it's possible to gather a sizable collection based just on this one book. There's even an audio book version. The above oversized book is the same one that I've had since I was three years old! This is by far the best Sesame book ever!

This is a small board book edition, published by Random House in 1999. It's much smaller than the above three versions of this book, and measures only 5 and 3/4 inches tall. Below is a side view to show how thick the book is.

The curious thing about this Random House board book is that it says on the back cover that the copyright for the book was renewed in 1999 by Sesame Workshop. It had always been my understanding that Sesame Workshop was founded in 2000 when the rights to Sesame Street were sold, and the Children's Television Workshop was rebranded to become Sesame Workshop. So I guess things got started in 1999 instead, and as such this may have been one of the first products to feature the new Sesame Workshop logo, as shown on the back cover. The new logo replaces the CTW in the original Sesame Street sign logo with 123.

Sesame Street Books by Signet

This softcover book is from one of the first series of Sesame Street books published in January 1971 by Signet, roughly a year after the debut of Sesame Street in Nov 1969. Several books were made in this format as part of this series.

TELL-A-TALE BOOKS, by Whitman /Golden, 1970's -80's

During the 1970's and early 1980's Whitman / Golden published a wide assortment of children's books based on Sesame Street. Shown above are smaller sized "Tell-A-Tale" books which measure roughly 5.5 inches wide by 6 1/4 inches high. I recall these small books were sold in grocery stores at the time, displayed in baskets that hung from the shelf in the aisles of the store. That's a smart way to sell a children's book, as it's something kids can grab from their perch in the shopping basket that parents would let them hold onto to keep quiet! A shrewd bit of marketing! I have a few more of these and will post them eventually! 

"How to be a Grouch" was written and illustrated by Caroll Spinney himself (the original puppeteer who performed Oscar and Big Bird).

More Sesame books by Western Publishing / Golden Books:

This book is from 1980, published by Golden Books / Western Publishing Company. The cover and all of the pages of this "Sturdy Shape Book" are made from a thick cardboard that doesn't bend. I especially like this cover illustration of Big Bird.

"We're Counting On Your Grover", 1991 and "It's No Fun to be Sick", 1989. Both of these books have the same illustrations on the inside front and back covers showing classic Sesame characters such as Barkly the Dog, Herry Monster, Prairie Dawn and Betty Lou along with main characters Big Bird, Oscar, Cookie Monster, Grover, Ernie and Bert. Notably, Elmo is not included as he was not yet a main character.

Random House has published a series of large hardcover Sesame Street books. The above book is from 1973 (the same year that I was born!), so at the time of printing the show itself had only been on TV for four years! As such the book features classic characters such as Sherlock Hemlock, and even has a story with Sam the Robot, shown below.

Many more books coming soon!