We had Little Golden Books in the house, and the one that I was enamored with was The Color Kittens by Margaret Wise Brown, of Goodnight Moon fame. (I never even heard of Goodnight Moon until I read it to my sister's kids aeons later, even though it predated The Color Kittens.) It's likely that I picked out the book myself at some point, being drawn not only to the kittens on the front, but the very colourful illustrations inside. I've always loved paints, crayons, and the names of colours. This is the edition that I had as a very little girl, I think. My book is long gone.
This page of this book especially was my favourite.
All of the pages were about a colour and what it felt like or what things were that colour. It was so creative and imaginative.
When I was older, probably about seven or eight, I was going to the library once a week with my mom and my sister. I was allowed to take out eight books. I started reading the Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Not all of them were always available, so I read them out of order, and some of them I read several times. I loved those books so much! These look pretty close to a couple of the ones I read from my little tiny town library, but most were recovered in plain hardcover library binding. They got a lot of wear.
When I was about ten or eleven, my brother was selected to go to a special summer program at Oberlin College, which was about twenty-five minutes away from our home. He was given some books to read, and he shared them with me. One was To Kill a Mockingbird, the edition below.
I obviously didn't have the depth or maturity to fully appreciate or understand this book at such a young age, but I loved it. I felt especially drawn to Jem, and I was so impressed by Atticus. I borrowed this book from my brother's bookshelf many times. As so many of you know, it became my favourite book of all time, and I was lucky enough to teach it dozens of years during my career. Each time I assigned it to my students, I, too, read it again right along with them. It never stops being powerful for me.
One last book that I loved and that came into my life at a very critical time was this one.
When I was nine, I had emergency surgery for a burst appendix. It was quite serious, and I was in the hospital for a very long time. I missed my family, my home, and Easter, too. My godmother sent me a tower of presents, and among them was this book of colour poetry. I still have it to this day, and I used to use it in my Creative Writing II class. The poems it inspired from my students were profoundly original and beautiful. It's not unlike The Color Kittens, really. Just more sophisticated. The way these two books echo one another makes me smile and feel very...complete.
I'd love it if you'd share some favourite books from your childhood with all of us in Comments.
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The difference between what was expected in kindergarten when we were kids and what is expected now is really unbelievable. I was a young reader like you. I vividly remember my first favorite book, a Little Golden Book called We Help Mommy. I dearly loved that book. My favorites after that from what I can remember were Nancy Drew books. I probably read every single one. Later, I can remember the book Are You There God It's Me Margaret really had an impact on me. Another that I read when I was really too young to read it was Go Ask Alice. I'm glad I read it when I did, it was always in the back of my head through my teen years.
ReplyDeleteMartha--I read the Nancy Drew books, too. My older sister had a whole bookshelf of those and the original green-covered collection of the Bobbsey Twins series, too. I basically read everything she read.
DeleteMy younger sister read Are You There God in school. The teacher read it aloud, a chapter a day, I think. She then ordered it herself at a book fair. I remember Go Ask Alice, but I don't remember how old I was when I read it. Like you, probably too young.
I read the BETSY series at our local Library. SNOWBOUND with Betsy was my favorite. A Snowstorm means Betsy is shut in . That's all I remember! I loved James and the Giant Peach and read it before willy Wonka.
ReplyDeletekathy b--I read the Betsy books, too. I never read James and the Giant Peach, and I read Willy Wonka when one of my sons brought it home!
DeleteOh, where to start with children’s books! My parents used to take us to the public library every Saturday for several years when I was a kid, and I loaded up with the maximum number of books allowed. The ones that stand out now are the Beverly Cleary books (Beezus & Ramona, Henry Huggins), Mary Poppins, The Borrowers, The Secret Garden, Blue Willow, Charlotte’s Web, the Chronicles of Narnia… and eventually I fell into the Nancy Drew trap, lol. As an adult I discovered Roald Dahl’s children’s books and loved them. In later teen years, one book that stands out is A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I also loved anything by Charlotte & Emily Brontë, and biographies for non-fiction.
ReplyDeleteI loved The Borrowers. I built many small houses for them and always included a sign welcoming them to move in!
DeleteOrtizzle--I read the Beverly Cleary books, too, and I bought the Ramona books in hardback as an adult. I reread them every now and again. Cleary writes children wonderfully, and Ramona is my favourite.
DeleteI was read Charlotte's Web aloud, a chapter a day, by a teacher in elementary school. It felt magical to me.
After I read all my sister's Nancy Drew books, I discovered Trixie Belden, another girl detective who was a bit more modern. I used my paper route money to buy those books.
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is another book very, very dear to my heart.
I loved The Borrowers too!
DeleteI have numerous books from childhood, gifts from relatives packed away in boxes I haven’t looked at in years, but don't recall their titles now except for The Bobbsey Twins, though I wasn’t that enthusiastic about the series. I do remember when I was elementary school age being allowed to take the city bus that stopped near my house downtown all by myself, then walking the block to our city library where I roamed the stacks, venturing into the adult section, examining what books I might want to bring home. I recall deciding to look for thicker books because they had longer stories that generally were much more interesting. There were some books I found with content which I discovered the librarians would say, “This book is too old for you” and I wouldn't be allowed to check out the book. So, in the future I tried to figure out which ones I thought they wouldn't let me check out and I would just spend time in the stacks reading some of them. Some I read when I was much older and realized there were subtleties to the stories that had escaped me in my naivety. But in my youth, I selected the 3, 4 or 5 maximum, I think it was, of other books I felt confident the librarian would allow me to check out. Only one title comes to mind right now, though not necessarily a favorite, was Lorna Doone, though I have sometimes recalled others fairly advanced that I had read when a title would be mentioned. Unfortunately, when life circumstances changed, plus we moved to the country, later out of state beginning when I was Junior High age my reading material access became much more limited, mostly to what was presented in school English classes, especially the literature class where I encountered nonsense verse — “I never saw a purple cow”, memorized a stanza of “Thanatopsis”, “So live that when thy summons comes....” (words with meaning for me today), and fell in love with Shakespeare’s Hamlet when we were treated to the film with Lawrence Olivier thanks to that teacher. (I hadn’t seen a movie for years). I recall feeling so starved for reading one summer that I became enamored with Raintree County an acquaintance of my mother’s gave her for me saying her son had received it in his book of the month subscription but didn't want it and maybe I would like it if Mom thought it was okay for me to read. Mom never censored my reading material though she discouraged most comic books in favor of graphic true stories when I had been younger. She never appreciated my attraction to the satire of Mad Magazine and the “What, me worry?” boy as I got older.
ReplyDeleteJoared--Mad Magazine, though it's often looked at with a sneer, was really great satire and parody. My brother either had a subscription or was sure to buy it whenever it came out, and I read it all the time. My father especially loved it, and he used to laugh until the tears came at a great deal of its content. I wish we still had those old magazines now.
DeleteI couldn't stand to read when I was young. Too busy playing outdoors. Or dolls. In fact I was mostly a Tom boy...building stuff like tree houses, doing menial chores at my grandparents, etc. I didn't get into reading until Jr. High. Then, it was the classics by Steinbeck, dickens, hugo, poe, etc. If it's children's books you want I read dr. Suess to my kids, but their favorite (and mine) was Lamont the lonely monster. It's worth a fortune now (my daughter has the original copy I bought years ago)
ReplyDeleteAnni--Not everyone is a reader, that's for sure. My husband detested reading and still doesn't read books. Opposites attract, and all that.
DeleteLots of junior high kids go through a Poe phase, despite the difficulty of his language and sentence structure. The draw is his creepy subject matter and his odd life.
Dee--What a lovely memory, hitching a ride with your dad so you could go to the library. We readers find a way to get our books.
ReplyDeleteI never went through the horsey stage myself, but I know that many young girls do. Do you know I still haven't ever read Black Beauty or even seen the film? Don't hold it against me.
Dee--LOL. Thanks for the advice. I can imagine!
ReplyDeleteWow - so many of my favorites mentioned above - Trixie Beldon, Nancy Drew, The Borrowers... I read several Heidi books (they were in my aunt's room at my grandmother's house). When I was really small, I love The Old Black Witch - probably because she made pancakes for the kids. Ha! I really like mystery type books, so there were a couple of series like that that I would read (Encyclopedia Brown, and some group of kids that I can't remember the name of).
ReplyDeleteI always had my nose in a book, and remember reading ahead when I was in first grade. I had to know what happened to Dick & Jane! Ha!
I think the mystery series was The Secret Seven because the only character I can remember is Colin (I thought it was pronounced Colon - ha!).
DeleteBug--Oh, I loved Encyclopedia Brown. It taught me deductive reasoning. Those books I also borrowed from my brother, who collected and read them.
DeleteI also got out a bunch of Rupert Piper books from the library because he read them, too, and used to laugh out loud while reading them. (Rupert was the main character, not the author.)
I was an early reader, too....and quickly dove into the Nancy Drew series...the Borrowers...Mr. Popper's Penguins...and all those wonderful books by Eleanor Estes about the Moffets and Pye familes!!! Such great memories. Sort of along this thread...my bookclub has decided that for one month next year, we would reread a book from our younger days and see if it had as much impact today as it did then. This started with one member's husband remembering thinking The Fountainhead was amazing...but rereading it, thought it was rather blah. I'm still debating...Go Tell it on the Mountain or Native Son. I think both would have meaning today, and while I thought they were wonderful in the '60s when I read them, I couldn't tell you one single thing about them. The joys of aging!!! All that's old is new again!!!
ReplyDeletesteph--What a great idea from your book club. I read Native Son way too early, too. Black Boy also. I must have been a pre-teen...? My sister was in college and had to read them. I picked them up and read them, too.
DeleteI remember quite a bit from both, but they're both mixed together. I bet as you read, you'll remember more than you know. It IS a joy of aging, LOL. Rediscovering things we thought were lost.
I spent a lot of time at the library as a kid. I did love to read. I remember collecting the Nancy Drew books and to this day mystery is my favorite type of book!
ReplyDeleteEllen D--Wasn't it wonderful to be able to go to the library and merely pick out a book? I thought the whole concept was astounding as a child. I read a lot of mystery books as a child and younger adult, and unlike you, I kind of burned out on them. I don't read them anymore.
DeleteThey're still incredibly popular, as any glance at the NYT Bestseller list will tell you. People love mysteries, whether they are solved by "titian-haired detectives" or not.
When I was really little I had a book called “Richard Scary’s Best Storybook Ever” that had a section on colors that I found VERY satisfying, with a different page for each color. I thought it was beautiful. I still have an old copy of ‘The Animal World of Thornton Burgess’ that I have always loved, signed to me in 1968 by my mom’s best friend, Kate. She signed it ‘Aunt Kate’, and because they both moved and lost touch with each other, I didn’t know who that was. Sad. Happily, the Internet was invented, and I found her for my mom on Classmates.com in 2000 or 2001. And of course I adored the Little House books, and still read them sometimes. There is a newish book, called Caroline, by Sarah Miller that I really enjoyed. It’s the story of one of the books in the series, Little House on the Prairie, told from Caroline’s point of view. Really good.
ReplyDeleteJ--I like the Richard Scarry books. One of them is very busy, and I used to use it like a Where's Waldo book for my kids, having them find certain things.
DeleteYou just made me realize that I have NONE of the Little House books in my possession as an adult. That seems so odd to me, now that I think of it. I did get the annotated biography of Laura Ingalls that you recommended to me.
Babar the Elephant, Heidi, Anne of Green Gables (the whole series), Kipling's the Jungle Books, to name a few. My favourite memory, though, is of facing down the librarian at my public school. We were supposed to take out books from shelves marked for our grade, but I had worked through everything on those shelves that I wanted to read, and so I moved up and found a book called 'The Lat Days of Pompeii'. When I tried to check it out, as I now recall the incident, the librarian told me that it was too old for me. I opened the book and read a piece to her and she let me borrow it. I loved that book a lot, mostly because of my win, I think.
ReplyDeleteLast Days of Pompeii.
ReplyDeleteMary--What a terrific story! I'm so glad you were strong and brave enough to stand your ground and read aloud to the librarian in order to check out that book. So smart.
DeleteI read through our teeny tiny library at our school, which was set back on our stage on metal shelving. We didn't have room for a proper library and didn't have a librarian, obviously. Library time was brief, too.
I also read and reread Heidi. I loved that book.
My public school was opulent ... a 1920's construction with a gym, full auditorium, art room with loom, music room, and a big library. Windsor, Ontario, n the plush car building days. We also had a Carnegie library, and smaller branch ones throughout the city. When I was 11 my family moved and my new school had none of these things. I was old enough to take the bus to the city library though. And my family bought me books for every occasion. I may be the original bookworm. Forgot to mention the Wizard of Oz books. Imstill have a few of those that outlasted my kids.
ReplyDeleteNance, I wanted to come back to this older post to let you know that it inspired me to find and order one of my favorite books from childhood, December Is for Christmas. Do you know that book? It is a Wonder book (similar to Little Golden Books--same era, I believe) with a delightful and whimsical story about Jeremy the rabbit who could read and the Christmas "messages" he keeps coming across. His rabbit family is at first unimpressed but in the end they and many other creatures celebrate a glorious Christmas together, all because of the knowledge gleaned from Jeremy's readings. My childhood copy of this book was in pretty bad shape so I had ordered another pristine copy online several years ago. Of course, that copy and the rest of my Christmas children's book collection went west with the house mess. But now, because of you, I have a "new" pristine copy in hand and it makes me so very happy!
ReplyDeleteI am not familiar with The Color Kittens but I can see why it impressed you. A Margaret Wise Brown book that I loved reading to Bo (especially at bedtime), much more than Goodnight Moon, was The Big Red Barn. It had a similar message in that the barn and all its inhabitants were settling down for the night after a full day. It was completely relatable for Bo as he basically grew up on his grandparents' farm and observed most of the same animals day in and day out.
I don't remember a lot of books from childhood (other than the classics like The Three Bears, Hansel and Gretel, etc., which were also Little Golden Books) until I was reading voraciously on my own. I read all the mystery series of the time. Nancy Drew, Trixie Belden, Bobbsey Twins, and Brains Benton. Nothing earth shattering, just simple entertainment for a kid my age.
Shirley--I'm so glad you got another copy of your beloved and treasured book. I'm not familiar with that particular one (there are so many Golden Books!), but any bunny named Jeremy has my heart.
DeleteThe Little Golden Books are so aptly named, aren't they? The space that they occupy in our memories are truly Golden. Each one has that potential to become much-loved and treasured, even though it is a small story. Thank you for coming back here to share your Golden Memory of "December Is for Christmas."