Tuesday, December 16, 2008

From the bookshelf in the corner

Our 1865-built school had no library, but there was a bookshelf in each room. It wasn't a very large bookcase. I suppose there was a tiny budget and one or two new books appeared in each classroom each year. One of those books was Freedom Train: The Story of Harriet Tubman, the year it was first published. It was written by Dorothy Sterling, who died at the age of 95, just this month. The book has stayed in print, in one form or another, all these years. I remember the hardbound copy that I read and enjoyed. I wonder what I'd think of it now. I don't see that the Austin Public Library has a copy in any of its branches. Some other books that I can remember reading from those shelves are Around the World in Eighty Days (in fourth grade, unabridged; don't know the translation), and Children of Odin (by Padraic Colum; fifth grade), and Otto of the Silver Hand (Howard Pyle; fifth grade).

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