It’s hard to tell the kids whom to look up to these days. In a world of media revolving around criminals on Wall Street, responsibility-averse corporate shills and political figures who are far from knights in shining armor, there aren’t really any tangible figures for children to model themselves after — short of Steve from Blues Clues (whose accusations of heroine use make this one iffy) or Dora the Explorer (will all children in the US grow up with a Spanish accent?). Dallas Clayton is changing that, and showing America that you can follow your heart and begin a business in a charitable fashion and at the same time become a role model to kids. His story sounds like the plot for a new Disney movie, and that’s why he’s in the business of writing children’s books. I’m even hesitant to say, “he’s in the business”, due to the fact that most of the books he distributes are being donated, free of price.

Working on a project titled A Very Awesome World, Dallas Clayton has already sold 30,000 copies of his book (An Awesome Book…that’s the title) and given away the same number of copies. Clayton really summarizes the foundation best when he was asked how it all began: “Well essentially I wrote a book for kids about dreaming — that when we sleep we dream of really crazy amazing fantastical concepts but often times when we are awake we dream of really mundane simple things like having our couch cushions match. I wanted to talk to kids about this, because they are all still in such a fantastical state as it is, and let them know that the dreams they have in their lives, their aspirations and hopes can be just as wild or far-reaching as they ones they have when they are sleeping. So I published the book by myself and it sort of took off from there; after the book hit the internet people started e-mailing me from all over asking me to come read to their classes, hospitals, camps, etc and so I went on tour and gave away books. That’s where the foundation was born.” Dallas Clayton is on a rare mission, but hopefully will soon receive more recognition for the amazing things he is doing for children and the entire foundation of children’s books. One baby step at a time.

“When we sleep we dream of really crazy amazing fantastical concepts, but often times when we are awake we dream of really mundane simple things like having our couch cushions match.”