George Dillwyn Parrish was an American writer, illustrator, and painter.
13 Facts About Dillwyn Parrish
1.
2.
Dillwyn Parrish was the son of Thomas Parrish, who came from an artistic Philadelphia family, and Anne Lodge, who had studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, becoming a respected portrait painter, and becoming a friend of Mary Cassatt in Paris.
3.
Dillwyn Parrish was the younger brother of author Anne Parrish; they were cousins to the artist Maxfield Parrish who used them as models in some of his paintings.
4.
Dillwyn's father Thomas gained success in the Colorado mining business but died when Dillwyn was relatively young.
5.
Dillwyn Parrish's mother moved the family back to her hometown of Claymont, Delaware.
6.
In 1923, Dillwyn Parrish did the illustrations for a 209-page children's novel written by his sister Anne, Knee-High to a Grasshopper.
7.
In 1929, they moved permanently to California, where a few years later, the beautiful Gigi Dillwyn Parrish was signed to a contract with Samuel Goldwyn's motion picture company and in 1934 she became one of the WAMPAS Baby Stars.
8.
Dillwyn and Gigi Parrish rented a beach house in Laguna Beach, next door to Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher and her husband Alfred Fisher.
9.
Dillwyn Parrish fell in love with Mary Fisher, and after encouraging her writing, helped get her culinary essays published in 1937 under the title Serve it Forth.
10.
Dillwyn Parrish married Mary Fisher in 1938 and next year Harper published their co-written novel Touch and Go under the pseudonym of Victoria Berne.
11.
Dillwyn Parrish suffered from Buerger's disease, which resulted in the amputation of a leg.
12.
Dillwyn Parrish was cremated, his ashes buried under an overhanging rock on the mountain rim overlooking their home.
13.
Dillwyn Parrish's death impelled his widow into writing more books, mostly culinary.