James Burd Brewster

James Burd Brewster grew up in Albany, NY. He spent time on Lake Champlain where he learned to sail, and while in the US Coast Guard, navigated a Polar Icebreaker. James is married to Katie Spivey. He and Katie raised five children in Maryland, first in Baltimore and then in Southern Maryland. In 1990, when his two oldest boys (Ben and Luke) where 5 and 3 respectively, he began putting them to bed with a fireman story. What started then as an excellent father/son experience, became, twenty-four years later, the “Glad to do it!” series of children’s picture books. In each story James told, the Fireman, Uncle Rocky, rescued someone and that person always said, “Thank you.” In response, Uncle Rocky thanked God he could rescue the person and then looked the person in the eye and said, “Glad to do it!” When police and EMTs were added to the stories, they all said, “Glad to do it!” and thus the name of the series.