Who's Who in Oz is a guidebook to the characters in the classic Oz novels. It was written by Jack Snow, and published by Reilly & Lee in 1954. A reprint of the original edition was issued by Peter Bedrick Books in 1988.
Snow's guide includes characters from all of the 39 official books existing at the time. The last of the "Famous Forty", Eloise Jarvis McGraw and Lauren Lynn McGraw's Merry Go Round in Oz (1963), was published after Snow's death. His Who's Who contains capsule biographies of 630 Oz characters:
- 221 from the 14 works of L. Frank Baum
- 329 from the 19 works of Ruth Plumly Thompson
- 38 from the 3 works of John R. Neill
- 25 from the 2 works by Snow himself
- 17 from 1 work by Rachel Cosgrove.
The volume concludes with short summaries of the 39 books, and brief biographical notices of the eight pre-1954 Oz authors and illustrators.
The book also features more than 490 illustrations from the Oz canon by Neill, Frank Kramer, and Dirk Gringhuis. (None of W. W. Denslow's pictures from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is included; that was the one Oz book not published by the Reilly & Britton/Reilly & Lee firm. In 1957, the book's copyright expired, and Reilly published their edition at last.)
Continuity errors and unreliable information[]
Who's Who in Oz includes a fair bit of character information which is not consistent with the books being indexed, and also indulges in creative speculation not supported by the text. Snow also alphabetizes haphazardly, listing some Kings, Queens, and even Doctors, under their titles rather than their names. Some character names are spelled differently in their title headings than in the articles themselves. "Joker" precedes "John." Glegg is counterintuitively listed under his first initial "J."
Significant guest characters are omitted, including King Pompus, the Phanfasms, and the Gabooches.
Continuing an error begun in The Magical Mimics in Oz, Snow treated the Soldier with the Green Whiskers and the Guardian of the Gates as one character, though Baum and Thompson always treated them as two separate figures. Snow listed the Soldier under both his names as Omby Amby (the name Baum gave to him in Ozma of Oz) and as Wantowin Battles (a name which Thompson used only in Ozoplaning with the Wizard of Oz), acknowledging that they seem to be two interpretations of the same character.
Snow assigns titles such as Prince, King, and Queen to characters who never had them in the stories. An example is Perix, a minor character from Grampa in Oz, to whom Snow arbitrarily assigns the title Prince. In the novel Perix was not given any title, and was only implied to be of nobility.
Sir Hokus of Pokes is said to be a native of England, as suggested during his introduction in The Royal Book of Oz. Hokus' official backstory, given in The Yellow Knight of Oz, is that he is from Corumbia in the Winkie Country. This is somewhat excusable, as this was an abrupt and incongruous retcon on Thompson's part.
Characters' full names are often omitted when this information would be helpful. E.g., Peter Brown and Bucky Jones are missing their surnames, with Bucky being listed in L as Lucky Bucky. Real names are never given for Speedy (William J. Harmsted II), Button-Bright (Saladin Paracelsus de Lambertine Evagne von Smith), King Bud (Timothy) & Princess Fluff (Margaret) of Noland, nor for Snow's own creations Tom & Twink (Zebediah & Abadiah Jones).
As a further matter relating to the above, the article Terrybubble assigns Peter's hometown of Philadelphia to Speedy, who is from Long Island.
Irashi the Rough, who held the title Pasha of Rash, is the lead villain of The Hungry Tiger of Oz. Snow lists him as "Rough Pasha" (a wording which the novel never used) rather than by his name. It should be noted that the original novel abruptly changed the character's name from Irasha to Irashi, a jarring change which may have confused Snow.
Entries relating to Ozoplaning with the Wizard of Oz give the impression that the novel ended with Princess Azarine living in exile in the Emerald City, and the evil Bustabo ruling her homeland. In the novel, Azarine was restored to power by Ozma, and Bustabo was transformed into a squirrel.
Some people's and places' names are misspelled, e.g. Dicksy Land becomes "Diksey Land," and Marshland becomes "Mudland." The "wozard" Ozwoz (The Purple Prince of Oz) becomes "Ozwog."
Some locales within Oz are placed within the wrong country (Winkie Country v Gillikin Country v Munchkin Country v Quadling Country), although this can be excused because the texts themselves, as well as the official maps, are often vague and confusing on such matters.
A few animal characters are misgendered. E.g., the stork from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz and Nikobo the Hippo from Captain Salt in Oz are listed as male, when they were female in their novels.
Faleero is catalogued only for her fleeting reference in Kabumpo in Oz, not her active villain role in The Purple Prince of Oz.
Much confusion surrounds the chronology of Jinnicky the Red Jinn. He is said to have first appeared in The Purple Prince of Oz, but had previously appeared in Jack Pumpkinhead of Oz. His servant Ginger is correctly acknowledged as having debuted in Jack, but is referred to as being the servant of Baron Mogodore, divorcing Ginger from all connection with Jinnicky and ignoring his more substantial roles in Purple and The Silver Princess in Oz. A portrait of Jinnicky's barber is presented as the Barber of Rash from The Hungry Tiger of Oz. This last has created speculation that the Rash barber simply found new employment with Jinnicky, an idea which is plausible but never even implied by the text.
The entry for Coo-ee-oh states that a Krumbic Witch is “about seven times worse than an ordinary witch,” a claim which Glinda of Oz never even implied. Similarly, the concept of Yookoohoo in the same book is referred to as "Yookoohoo Witch", when an earlier reference in The Tin Woodman of Oz implied that Yookoohoo and Witch are mutually exclusive titles. In addition, the article "Mrs. Yoop" refers to "Kookoohoo."
Colonel Crinkle's off-stage execution in The Emerald City of Oz is followed up with the idea that his corpse gave indigestion to the dogs which ate it, another bit of creative speculation on Snow's part. He neglects to mention that Crinkle's final rank was General. This last may be excusable, as the generalship was a unconfirmed theoretical promotion, obtained only minutes before his death sentence.
In Rinkitink in Oz, the super-dragon Choggenmugger was killed by Nikobob. Snow claims that Choggenmugger "grew back together again" sometime later, but such an accomplishment is never alluded to in any canonical source.
Belfaygor of Bourne from Jack Pumpkinhead of Oz, is said to rule over all the other barons, which was not the case in the novel.
"Starina" from Ozoplaning with the Wizard of Oz is given a character entry. Starina was never a character, it was simply a royal title that Jellia Jamb was forced to accept for a brief time.
Entries relating to The Giant Horse of Oz treat Tattypoo and the Good Witch of the North as two separate people. There has been fan speculation that Snow did this in order to establish a new continuity element, which would allow him to create his own version of the Good Witch in an unrealized story.
Further information[]
James E. Haff extended the coverage of the book in Who's Who in Oz: An Appendix (1994), while Ruth Berman produced a Who's Who in the Borderlands of Oz (2002). Peter B. Clarke expanded the scope of reference in Who's Who, What's What and Where's Where in Oz: The Canon, An Index to the People, Creatures, Things and Places in Oz in the First Forty Books (1994), issued in revised edition as The Index to Oz: A comprehensive annotated index to all the people, creatures, places and things in sixty Oz books (comprising the "Canon" and the "Apocrypha"), from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz to Yankee in Oz (2002).
Other unpublished encyclopedias include an Encyclopedia of Oz by Daniel P. Mannix and The Ozopedia by John Ebinger and Pam Guzman.