Ruby Bridges Goes to School: My True Story
The year is 1961. Ruby Bridges attended the school for black children as a kindergartener. Today she is starting first grade in a school much closer to home, one that used to be only for white children. For months, it was only Ruby and her teacher, Mrs. Henry, were the only ones in the school because white parents would not let their children attend a school that had been integrated. Finally, some students began coming back to the school, and Ruby had children to play with.
Ruby Bridges Goes to School: My True Story, by Ruby Bridges, is a wonderful little biography written for children aged 4 to 8 years. With beautiful photograph collages, the short book takes on a world of meaning that shows how one brave little girl could change the attitudes of an entire neighborhood during the racial tensions of the early 1960s.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Unavoidable Delays in Posting
Originally, I meant to post on 3 books per week during Black History Month, 1 book at each of 3 age levels. I had surgery scheduled in early February, but I didn't think that would interfere much with my plans. Unfortunately, some complications kept me in the hospital longer than I expected, and left me weaker than anticipated. So... although several posts will be too late for this year's Black History Month, I will continue reviewing on the 12 planned books, as these are all books that can be read at any time. They are simply a focus during February.
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Friday, February 4, 2011
A Teen Book for African American Heritage Month
Mare and her two granddaughters, Octavia (Tave) and Talitha (Tali), left me in Alabama as they continued driving east. Weeks earlier, we all left California, headed for Mare's family reunion in Alabama. I finished reading the book only an hour ago and already feel homesick for their company. Octavia tells the travel story and shares the postcards she sends home to friends, while Mare spins tales of growing up in Alabama and gaining her own kind of independence in the Women's Army Corps (WAC) in the European theater during the 1940s.
Mare's War, by Tanita S. Davis, is the story of two wars--a psychological mother-daughter war, and a physical war in Europe. In addition, there was a type of war at home in Alabama that kept colored and white people separated by neighborhood boundaries, old "traditions," and job possibilities.
Marey Lee Boylen was seventeen when she forged her mother's signature to the enlistment permission form and joined the WACs. After her father died, she had to quit school to help her mother out with the farm he had purchased and the house he had built and the mortgage he had left. She worked two jobs--as a house girl for Mrs. Ida Payne, and as kitchen help for Young's Diner. Since her mother was constantly taking up with unsuitable men and hiding in her bottle of whiskey, Mare was also left to care for her younger sister, Feen. Then her mother stopped talking to her after Mare used an ax to fend off an attack on her sister from "Uncle" Toby. Feen was shipped off to live with her aunt in Philadelphia, and Mare's purpose in life--to take care of her sister--was taken away.
In the Army, Mare met colored women who grew up in other parts of the United States and had finished high school. One in particular, Peach, immediately befriended her and began teaching her skills she could not afford to learn at home--including how to speak standard English. All the girls in her unit became a family, watched each other's backs, and helped each other out. Together, they made it through basic training, escaped an attack by a Nazi submarine as they were deployed to England, survived air raids over England, and endured both squalor in northern France and luxury accommodations in Paris. Still they managed to squeeze in a bit of site-seeing and partying.
Finally, World War II's western battles were ended, American personnel left the clean-up of Axis force prisoners-of-war and unexploded mines to their European Allied forces, and Mare was sent home--but not before Peach told her that she was going on to San Francisco, where there were more job opportunities for colored women. Mare considered the possibility of moving to San Francisco, too, and taking Feen along with her. After all, her mother had remarried (although Mare learned this from a neighbor) and Feen was back home in Alabama. Mare was determined that Feen would finish school and have more opportunities than being household help. First, she had to settle things with her mother.
The chapters of Mare's story are broken up with Octavia's perception of the trip and the postcards she sends back to her friends. Although two years younger than her sister Tali, Octavia seems the more mature of the two. Or maybe she is just more timid. Through Octavia's chapters, we learn that Mare knows them better than they thought she did, and that the sisters knew each other better than the other knew. They stay in hotels and motels along the route, take some side trips (since Mare is the only one who knows where they are going, even when she lets Tali drive her car on Interstate 10), and learn about their grandmother as she tells the girls about just a few years of her life. In fact, although they start out being unhappy about the road trip, the girls find themselves more and more interested about their grandmother's stories and their journey.
Mare's War is a story of bridging a generation gap as much as about life for African American women during the 1940's. It helps modern teens understand that, although much progress had been made in American society between the Civil War and World War II in some parts of the country, other areas still had--and continue to have--a distance to go.
Kindle edition:
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Mare's War, by Tanita S. Davis, is the story of two wars--a psychological mother-daughter war, and a physical war in Europe. In addition, there was a type of war at home in Alabama that kept colored and white people separated by neighborhood boundaries, old "traditions," and job possibilities.
Marey Lee Boylen was seventeen when she forged her mother's signature to the enlistment permission form and joined the WACs. After her father died, she had to quit school to help her mother out with the farm he had purchased and the house he had built and the mortgage he had left. She worked two jobs--as a house girl for Mrs. Ida Payne, and as kitchen help for Young's Diner. Since her mother was constantly taking up with unsuitable men and hiding in her bottle of whiskey, Mare was also left to care for her younger sister, Feen. Then her mother stopped talking to her after Mare used an ax to fend off an attack on her sister from "Uncle" Toby. Feen was shipped off to live with her aunt in Philadelphia, and Mare's purpose in life--to take care of her sister--was taken away.
In the Army, Mare met colored women who grew up in other parts of the United States and had finished high school. One in particular, Peach, immediately befriended her and began teaching her skills she could not afford to learn at home--including how to speak standard English. All the girls in her unit became a family, watched each other's backs, and helped each other out. Together, they made it through basic training, escaped an attack by a Nazi submarine as they were deployed to England, survived air raids over England, and endured both squalor in northern France and luxury accommodations in Paris. Still they managed to squeeze in a bit of site-seeing and partying.
Finally, World War II's western battles were ended, American personnel left the clean-up of Axis force prisoners-of-war and unexploded mines to their European Allied forces, and Mare was sent home--but not before Peach told her that she was going on to San Francisco, where there were more job opportunities for colored women. Mare considered the possibility of moving to San Francisco, too, and taking Feen along with her. After all, her mother had remarried (although Mare learned this from a neighbor) and Feen was back home in Alabama. Mare was determined that Feen would finish school and have more opportunities than being household help. First, she had to settle things with her mother.
The chapters of Mare's story are broken up with Octavia's perception of the trip and the postcards she sends back to her friends. Although two years younger than her sister Tali, Octavia seems the more mature of the two. Or maybe she is just more timid. Through Octavia's chapters, we learn that Mare knows them better than they thought she did, and that the sisters knew each other better than the other knew. They stay in hotels and motels along the route, take some side trips (since Mare is the only one who knows where they are going, even when she lets Tali drive her car on Interstate 10), and learn about their grandmother as she tells the girls about just a few years of her life. In fact, although they start out being unhappy about the road trip, the girls find themselves more and more interested about their grandmother's stories and their journey.
Mare's War is a story of bridging a generation gap as much as about life for African American women during the 1940's. It helps modern teens understand that, although much progress had been made in American society between the Civil War and World War II in some parts of the country, other areas still had--and continue to have--a distance to go.
Kindle edition:
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Thursday, February 3, 2011
One Crazy Summer
Here is another book to consider reading during Black History Month. Written primarily for the nine- through twelve-year-old reader, One Crazy Summer presents a different perspective of the San Francisco Bay area of the late 1960's. Hippies are barely mentioned, as author Rita Williams-Gracia weaves her story through an African American neighborhood in Oakland, California, the city which birthed the Black Panther Party.
Peaceful resistance was not the only movement that brought civil rights issues to the forefront during the 1960's. One such movement, mainly associated with militancy and armaments, was the Black Panther Party, which called for revolutionary action and armed militia to protect citizens of African American communities from brutal encounters with police. But the Black Panthers did more than just throw Molotov cocktails into police buildings and provide armed protection for its communities. It was also an organization that provided meals and other services to the poor--a point that rarely makes its way into history books--probably because it is not part of the group's "manifesto."
In her book, One Crazy Summer, author Rita Williams-Garcia does not write about the Black Panther movement, but uses it as a background feature that contributed to changes in the lives of three young girls who were sent by their father to Oakland, California. The purpose of the trip from Brooklyn, New York, was for Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern to meet and get to know their mother, who had abandoned them when the eldest was not yet five years old and the youngest was only a few days old. They overheard their father, who raised the girls with help from his younger brother and Big Ma, his Alabama-born mother, "They need to know her, and she needs to know them....That's final" (p. 43).
The year is 1968. It is the summer immediately following the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the summer after the race riots that crippled cities throughout the United States. Eleven-year-old Delphine, the eldest of the three and the one "in charge" of her younger sisters, tells the story. The four-week visit starts out unwelcoming. Cecile, their mother, barely steps forward to claim them at the airport. She clearly sees them as an intrusion into her self-imposed exile as a struggling poet.
The girls are told the location of their room inside their mother's almost barren house, and told they are never allowed in the kitchen. Within the first twelve hours of meeting their mother, the girls are sent to Ming's for take-out and to the People's Center for free breakfast, where the girls stay on for the summer camp program, sponsored by the local Black Panthers. After all, Delphine is supposed to keep herself and her sisters out of the house for as long as possible. At least the camp program will use up some of the time.
One Crazy Summer is not about the Black Panthers. Rather, it is about learning to view from different perspectives. It is about a summer of growth, of reinterpretation of Big Ma's description of their mother, of change, and of understanding. Although meant for pre-teens, the book grips the adult reader so that the book is hard to put down. For those adults who remember the late 1960's, the book serves as a reminder of the changes American society has undergone during the past 50 years. For those too young to have experienced the civil rights struggles of the 1960's, it serves as an example of an era that bridged the gap between Negroes and Blacks (or African Americans). For all, it's a great read.
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Peaceful resistance was not the only movement that brought civil rights issues to the forefront during the 1960's. One such movement, mainly associated with militancy and armaments, was the Black Panther Party, which called for revolutionary action and armed militia to protect citizens of African American communities from brutal encounters with police. But the Black Panthers did more than just throw Molotov cocktails into police buildings and provide armed protection for its communities. It was also an organization that provided meals and other services to the poor--a point that rarely makes its way into history books--probably because it is not part of the group's "manifesto."
In her book, One Crazy Summer, author Rita Williams-Garcia does not write about the Black Panther movement, but uses it as a background feature that contributed to changes in the lives of three young girls who were sent by their father to Oakland, California. The purpose of the trip from Brooklyn, New York, was for Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern to meet and get to know their mother, who had abandoned them when the eldest was not yet five years old and the youngest was only a few days old. They overheard their father, who raised the girls with help from his younger brother and Big Ma, his Alabama-born mother, "They need to know her, and she needs to know them....That's final" (p. 43).
The year is 1968. It is the summer immediately following the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the summer after the race riots that crippled cities throughout the United States. Eleven-year-old Delphine, the eldest of the three and the one "in charge" of her younger sisters, tells the story. The four-week visit starts out unwelcoming. Cecile, their mother, barely steps forward to claim them at the airport. She clearly sees them as an intrusion into her self-imposed exile as a struggling poet.
The girls are told the location of their room inside their mother's almost barren house, and told they are never allowed in the kitchen. Within the first twelve hours of meeting their mother, the girls are sent to Ming's for take-out and to the People's Center for free breakfast, where the girls stay on for the summer camp program, sponsored by the local Black Panthers. After all, Delphine is supposed to keep herself and her sisters out of the house for as long as possible. At least the camp program will use up some of the time.
One Crazy Summer is not about the Black Panthers. Rather, it is about learning to view from different perspectives. It is about a summer of growth, of reinterpretation of Big Ma's description of their mother, of change, and of understanding. Although meant for pre-teens, the book grips the adult reader so that the book is hard to put down. For those adults who remember the late 1960's, the book serves as a reminder of the changes American society has undergone during the past 50 years. For those too young to have experienced the civil rights struggles of the 1960's, it serves as an example of an era that bridged the gap between Negroes and Blacks (or African Americans). For all, it's a great read.
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Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Biography of MLK for the Youngest Readers
To begin my reviews of children's and young adult's books related to Black History Month (February), I have chosen a book for the youngest readers--not because it is short and easy to review, but because it carries so much power in so few words. This book is also unique because it is one of the few biographies written--perhaps I should say well-written--for the four- through eight-year-old age range.
Martin's Big Words: The Life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., by Doreen Rappaport, is not a new book. It received plenty of honors in 2001, when it was first introduced. Awards included the Coretta Scott King Award honor status, and the Best Illustrated Children's Book category of the New York Times Book Review. Also, it was a Caldecott Honor Book during the same year.
Martin's Big Words continues to be among the best biographies written expressly for very young readers and pre-readers. It is wonderfully written, using quotations from Dr. King's speeches and writings to move the story along. That so much information can be relayed by such a short story, brilliantly enhanced with stunning illustrations by Bryan Collier, is a tribute to the writing style and artistic interpretation of a prize-winning author-illustrator team of Rappaport and Collier.
Children who know little or nothing about Dr. King will be as enchanted by Martin's Big Words as those who are familiar with the status that Dr. King has in modern American society. Even the youngest reader can learn how the honesty, integrity, and perseverance of one person can help change a nation for the better.
Needless to say, I love this book.
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Martin's Big Words: The Life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., by Doreen Rappaport, is not a new book. It received plenty of honors in 2001, when it was first introduced. Awards included the Coretta Scott King Award honor status, and the Best Illustrated Children's Book category of the New York Times Book Review. Also, it was a Caldecott Honor Book during the same year.
Martin's Big Words continues to be among the best biographies written expressly for very young readers and pre-readers. It is wonderfully written, using quotations from Dr. King's speeches and writings to move the story along. That so much information can be relayed by such a short story, brilliantly enhanced with stunning illustrations by Bryan Collier, is a tribute to the writing style and artistic interpretation of a prize-winning author-illustrator team of Rappaport and Collier.
Children who know little or nothing about Dr. King will be as enchanted by Martin's Big Words as those who are familiar with the status that Dr. King has in modern American society. Even the youngest reader can learn how the honesty, integrity, and perseverance of one person can help change a nation for the better.
Needless to say, I love this book.
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