Since the Fourth of July is Friday, it seems only natural to use my blog post to celebrate our Nation’s birth. I looked through an assortment of our children’s books and came up with a variety of expressions on what this special day means. All of the illustrations and text come from books in our Edgar and Faith King Juvenile Literature Collection.
From: America: Her Patriotic Stories and Exciting Events by Allen E. Fowler. 1898
The Story of the United States in Moving Pictures contains twelve reels, perforated disks in the pages, that can be removed and attached to the front of the book by means of a brass pin. You can then rotate the reel to view the images through the cut out area of the cover. The image below is of the cover; the following image is for July 4, 1776.
From: The Story of the United States in Moving Pictures: 12 Big Reels. Robert J. Bezucha and Neumann R. Von. 1931
From: The Story of the United States in Moving Pictures: 12 Big Reels. Robert J. Bezucha and Neumann R. Von. 1931
An American ABC describes important people and events in American history with a page devoted to each letter of the alphabet and an illustration accompanying each page of text.
From: An American ABC by Maud and Miska Petersham. 1941
After a brief history of the colonies banding together to form a nation, Broad Stripes and Bright Stars tells the story of the American flag. The author describes flag etiquette and changes to the flag over time. She ends with the story of how the National Anthem came to be written.
From: Broad Stripes and Bright Stars by Beatrice B. Grover. 1941
The History of the United States Told in One Syllable Words begins its history in 900 AD with the “Norse men” sailing to “Ice-land” and ends before “Ches-ter A. Ar-thur” ends his term of office. All words of more than one syllable are broken into syllables.
From: The History of the United States Told in One Syllable Words by Josephine Pollard. 1884
I end with my favorite book of the group, A Child’s History of America. This book was published right before our nation’s Bicentennial Anniversary. From the dust jacket: “Over 25,000 children from every corner of America have participated in the creation of this remarkable book. They have written and painted with the total involvement that is so joyously a part of childhood.” I have selected two pages to include here.
From: A Child’s History of America written by America’s Children. 1975
From: A Child’s History of America written by America’s Children. 1975
We hope you will find an opportunity to visit Special Collections this summer, and we hope you have a safe and enjoyable Fourth of July.
Jim Bricker
Senior Library Technician
