Hans Augusto Reyersbach was born on September 16, 1898, in Hamburg, Germany.  As a child he liked to draw and spent much of his free time at the nearby zoo…Rey also devoted many moments of class time sketching in his notebooks…By the war’s end, Hamburg’s economic state suffered and without steady employment Rey discovered he couldn’t afford to enroll in an art school…By lithographing circus posters, Rey scraped by and studied at the University of Hamburg and the University of Munich…Rey ventured across the ocean to sell bathtubs for an import business.  He didn’t like the work, and taking the advice of another Hamburg resident living in Brazil, Rey partnered together with her to make an advertising agency.

The couple found they worked well as a team and soon married. Margarete Elisabeth Waldstein blended her education in art, photography, and writing with Rey’s drawing ability…From Lisbon to Brazil and onto the United States, the Reys then settled in New York.  Within a month the publishers Houghton Mifflin bought four manuscripts, including the extremely successful Curious George.  In all, the Reys developed seven adventures for the monkey.  Rey also contributed to the advancement of astronomy by creating new diagrams of constellations seen by the naked eye in a suburban setting.

Rey took up teaching astronomy at the Cambridge Center for Adult Education.  He didn’t publish many books after 1963 but the books the Reys did create have remained popular and in print.  On August 26, 1977, H. A. Rey passed away, after spending over thirty years of his life as an illustrator and author.
FROM http://www.exodusbooks.com/author.aspx?id=502

“The Great Escape: a harrowing wartime escape and journey to the United States”~
http://www.neh.gov/humanities/2011/marchapril/statement/the-great-escape
Curious George~ http://www.curiousgeorge.com/#/books
Margret and H.A. Rey Center~ http://thereycenter.org/about-us.html
“The Stars: A New Way to See Them”~ http://www.codex99.com/illustration/26.html