Julia Child

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

Julia Child was born Julia Carolyn McWilliams on August 15, 1912, in Pasadena, California, the eldest of three children. She attended Smith College, graduating in 1934 with a major in history, and later worked as a copywriter in New York City. During World War II, she joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in 1942, starting as a typist before becoming a top-secret researcher working directly for General William J. Donovan. She also worked on developing a shark repellent to protect underwater explosives. While posted in Kandy, Ceylon, she met Paul Cushing Child, also an OSS employee; they married on September 1, 1946, in Lumberville, Pennsylvania. After the war, the couple moved to Paris in 1948. Child graduated from the Cordon Bleu cooking school in 1951 and studied privately with master chefs including Max Bugnard. Through the women's cooking club Le Cercle des Gourmettes, she met Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle. Together they taught cooking in Child's Paris kitchen as L'école des trois gourmandes and co-wrote Mastering the Art of French Cooking, published in 1961 by Alfred A. Knopf after an initial rejection by Houghton Mifflin. The 726-page book became a best-seller and received critical acclaim. Child's television career began after a 1961 appearance on a Boston book review show led to The French Chef, which debuted as a summer pilot on July 26, 1962, and became a regular series on February 11, 1963. The show ran nationally for ten years, winning Peabody and Emmy Awards, including the first Emmy for an educational program. In 1972, it became the first television program captioned for the deaf. Child's last book was the autobiographical My Life in France, published posthumously in 2006.

Reader's Guide

Julia Child's significance lies in her role as a cultural intermediary who made French cuisine accessible to a broad American audience through her detailed cookbook and engaging television programs. Mastering the Art of French Cooking, with its precise instructions and illustrations, demystified complex techniques, while The French Chef showcased her enthusiastic, unpatronizing manner. Her work emerged during a period of heightened American interest in French culture in the early 1960s. Child's legacy includes nearly twenty published titles, many tied to her shows, and a lasting influence on home cooking and food media. Her wartime service in the OSS, including work on a shark repellent that 'marked Child's first foray into the world of cooking,' and her correspondence with Avis DeVoto, who helped secure her book contract with Alfred A. Knopf editor Judith Jones, are notable aspects of her career. The continued print of her debut cookbook and the posthumous publication of her memoir underscore her enduring impact.

Did You Know?

• Julia Child was 6 feet 2 inches tall, which prevented her from enlisting in the Women's Army Corps or the Navy's WAVES during World War II.
• Her first foray into cooking involved experimenting with concoctions to create a shark repellent for the OSS, a formula still in use today.
• She typed over 10,000 names on white note cards as a research assistant in the OSS Secret Intelligence division.
• The French Chef became the first television program to be captioned for the deaf in 1972, using open-captioning technology.
• Child and Avis DeVoto exchanged around 120 letters over two years before they ever met in person.

Early Life and Formative Years

Julia Carolyn McWilliams entered the world on August 15, 1912, in Pasadena, California, a suburb of Los Angeles. Her father, John McWilliams Jr., was a Princeton University graduate and prominent land manager; her mother, Julia Carolyn Weston, was a paper-company heiress and daughter of Byron Curtis Weston, a lieutenant governor of Massachusetts. As the eldest of three children—followed by brother John McWilliams III and sister Dorothy Cousins—Julia grew up in a household that employed a cook, yet she did not observe or learn cooking from that person. That gap would not close until she met her future husband, Paul, who grew up in a family very interested in food. Her schooling took her through Polytechnic School and Westridge School from 4th to 9th grade in Pasadena, then to the Katherine Branson boarding school in Ross, California, for high school. As a youth, she played tennis, golf, and basketball. At Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, she continued playing sports and graduated in 1934 with a major in history. Her ambitions at that point leaned toward becoming a novelist or magazine writer. After moving to New York City, she worked as a copywriter for the advertising department of W. & J. Sloane, still hoping to become a novelist. Back in Pasadena, she joined the Junior League in 1935, contributing to its magazine and helping create children's plays.

Wartime Service in the OSS

When the United States entered World War II, Julia Child sought to enlist but found herself turned away from the Women's Army Corps (WACs) and the Navy's WAVES because at 6 feet 2 inches (1.88 m) she was too tall. In 1942 she joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), starting as a typist at its headquarters in Washington, D.C. Her education and experience soon earned her a promotion to top-secret researcher working directly for OSS head General William J. Donovan. As a research assistant in the Secret Intelligence division, she typed over 10,000 names on white note cards to keep track of officers. For a year, she worked at the OSS Emergency Sea Rescue Equipment Section (ESRES) as a file clerk and then as an assistant to developers of a shark repellent needed to ensure sharks would not explode ordnance targeting German U-boats. When asked to solve the problem of underwater explosives being set off by curious sharks, 'Child's solution was to experiment with cooking various concoctions as a shark repellent,' which were sprinkled in the water near the explosives and repelled sharks. Still in use today, the experimental shark repellent 'marked Child's first foray into the world of cooking.' During 1944–1945 she was posted to Kandy, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), where her responsibilities included registering, cataloging, and channeling highly classified communications for OSS clandestine stations in Asia. She was later posted to Kunming, China, where she received the Emblem of Meritorious Civilian Service as head of the Registry of the OSS Secretariat. For her service, she received an award citing her 'drive and inherent cheerfulness.' It was in Kandy that she met fellow OSS employee Paul Cushing Child, a New Jersey native who had lived in Paris as an artist and poet and was known for his sophisticated palate. They married on September 1, 1946, in Lumberville, Pennsylvania, later moving to a house in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C.

Postwar France and the Making of a Classic Cookbook

After the war, Paul joined the United States Foreign Service, and in 1948 the couple moved to Paris after the State Department assigned him as an exhibits officer with the United States Information Agency. Julia's culinary awakening came at a restaurant called La Couronne in Rouen, where a meal of oysters, sole meunière, and fine wine struck her as 'an opening up of the soul and spirit for me.' In 1951 she graduated from the famous Cordon Bleu cooking school in Paris and later studied privately with master chef Max Bugnard and other master chefs. Through the women's cooking club Le Cercle des Gourmettes she met Simone Beck, who was co-authoring a French cookbook for Americans with her friend Louisette Bertholle. Beck proposed that Child work with them to make the book appeal to Americans. In 1951, Child, Beck, and Bertholle began teaching cooking to American women in Child's Paris kitchen, calling their informal school L'école des trois gourmandes (The School of the Three Food Lovers). Over the following decade, as the Childs moved around Europe and finally to Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1961, the trio researched and repeatedly tested recipes. Child translated the French into English, making the recipes detailed, interesting, and practical. In 1963, the Childs built a home near the Provence town of Plascassier in the hills above Cannes on property belonging to Beck and her husband, Jean Fischbacher. They named it 'La Pitchoune,' a Provençal word meaning 'the little one.'

Television, Friendship, and Lasting Impact

Julia Child's most visible contribution to American food culture came through television. A 1961 appearance on a book review show on what was then the National Educational Television (NET) station of Boston, WGBH-TV, led to the inception of her first television cooking show after viewers enjoyed her demonstration of how to cook an omelette. The French Chef debuted as a summer pilot series on July 26, 1962, becoming a regular series on February 11, 1963, on WGBH. The show ran nationally for ten years and won Peabody and Emmy Awards, including the first Emmy award for an educational program. Though not the first television cook, Child was the most widely seen, attracting the broadest audience with her cheery enthusiasm, distinctively warbly voice, and unpatronizing, unaffected manner. In 1972, The French Chef became the first television program to be captioned for the deaf, using open-captioning technology. Beyond the camera, Child cultivated a rich personal life. In 1952, while still in Paris, she wrote to Avis DeVoto, responding to a column by DeVoto's husband Bernard about how he detested stainless steel knives; Child thought he was '100% right.' That letter initiated a correspondence and lifelong friendship, though the two women did not meet in person until 1954. During those first two years they exchanged around 120 letters, later compiled into the book As Always, Julia (2010). DeVoto served as an early reader and editor for Mastering the Art of French Cooking and helped Child and her co-authors sign a contract with Houghton Mifflin in 1954. When that publisher rejected the book, DeVoto helped push for Alfred A. Knopf editor Judith Jones to accept it. The Childs had no children. Her OSS file was declassified in 2008 and, unlike other files, her complete file is available online.