Category: Children’s Nonfiction Review

Mother Jones and Her Army of Mill Children

by Jonah Winter
illustrated by Nancy Carpenter

Schwartz & Wade Books, 2020. 36 pages.
Review written February 27, 2020, from a library book
Starred Review

The topic of this picture book biography stirred me up besides telling me about someone I hadn’t known much about. Mother Jones – Mary Harris Jones – was the “grandmother of all agitators.” She spoke out strongly against oppressive labor conditions, and especially about child labor. The title and the focus of the book are about a Children’s March where she led mill children on a protest march from Philadelphia to New York City in 1903, which she called the Children’s Crusade.

The book is written in first person from Mother Jones’ perspective. Quotes from her speeches are used in a few places, and famous quotes are included on the endpapers. All caps are used in places to convey her anger at injustice.

Well, I’ve seen lots of things to get RILED UP about, but the worst thing I ever saw was in the fabric mills of Philadelphia. I saw children YOUR AGE – nine and ten years old – who worked like grown-ups, forced to stand on their feet for TEN HOURS STRAIGHT, tying threads to spinning spools, reaching their hands inside the dangerous machines that make the fabric, sometimes getting skirts caught, sometimes getting hair caught, sometimes hands or legs, working for hours and hours, never resting, breathing deadly dust – robbed of their childhoods, robbed of their dreams, and all for a measly TWO CENTS AN HOUR, while outside the birds sang and the blue sky shone.

The majority of the book is about the Children’s March. They didn’t stop at New York City, but marched on to the summer home of President Theodore Roosevelt on Long Island – where he refused to see them.

But the actions of Mother Jones ended up resulting in child labor laws that are still in effect today.

I liked that the artist used a dark palette for this book, with sobering pictures of the kids – as well as happier pictures, such as when the kids tried out the rides on Coney Island.

This book gives an important story, and I’m glad I learned about it. It’s told in a way that kids can appreciate a woman – and children – who made a big difference.

nancycarpenter.website
rhcbooks.com

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Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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*Note* To try to catch up on posting reviews, I’m posting the oldest reviews I’ve written on my blog without making a page on my main website. They’re still good books.

Lizzie Demands a Seat!

Elizabeth Jennings Fights for Streetcar Rights

by Beth Anderson
illustrated by E. B. Lewis

Calkins Creek (Boyds Mills & Kane), 2020. 32 pages.
Review written April 22, 2020, from a library book
Starred Review

We’ve all heard of Rosa Parks, but in this book I learned about Lizzie Jennings, a free black woman who fought in court for her right to ride on streetcars with whites in New York State in 1854.

This picture book dramatizes her encounter. She was physically thrown off a streetcar on her way to church, but got right back on.

Five blocks later, the conductor hailed an officer.

Again a crowd gathered and watched in silence.

“Officer,” said the conductor, “the passengers object to this woman’s presence. It’s my duty to remove her.”

“No one objected!” Lizzie said, leaping up. “I have rights!”

The officer forced her off the streetcar. “Make your complaint. You’ll not get far.

Lizzie did go to court about it, with her whole community behind her. Her lawyer was Chester Arthur – who later became President of the United States.

The whole story is dramatic and inspiring. I’d had no idea that African Americans also had to fight for rights in the North – of course that shows my ignorance. It’s always good to read about someone standing up for what’s right. And especially good when they win rights for others as well.

The book is beautifully illustrated, with a nice variety of scenes pictured and a focus on faces. I’m glad this story is being told.

bethandersonwriter.com
eblewis.com

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Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from Fairfax County Public Library.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

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*Note* To try to catch up on posting reviews, I’m posting the oldest reviews I’ve written on my blog without making a page on my main website. They’re still good books.

The Enigma Girls

How Ten Teenagers Broke Ciphers, Kept Secrets, and Helped Win World War II

by Candace Fleming

Scholastic Focus, 2024. 371 pages.
Review written April 29, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

We’ve all heard stories about Alan Turing breaking the Enigma code in World War II, right? But did you know that literally thousands of girls under the age of 21 were also involved in monitoring enemy communications during World War II?

In this book, the title tells us that we’re tracking ten of those teenage girls, but honestly my one quibble with the book was that I couldn’t keep them straight at all. She was still introducing new characters toward the end of the book. But what made the book amazing despite that was the picture it gave of code breaking and intelligence gathering as the war progressed and what a large operation it grew to be, and how important. And taking the perspective of teenage girls who worked in this field brings home how many ordinary people were caught up in the effort.

The book progresses chronologically. It sounds like early on, they’d figured out how Enigma worked. Every day the settings changed, so every day they’d work on breaking the code. Once the code was broken, the cryptographers moved on to something else, and they had machines where girls would type in the messages with the new settings, and decoded messages would come out.

Then later in the war, they used giant computers that were programmed by connecting and disconnecting actual wires. In another department they’d figure out the settings, then they had the girls set up and run the machine. Another department translated messages from German and Italian. Another department indexed the messages on 3×5 cards to be able to understand the messages better. Other girls were hired to check radio frequencies and listen for messages and transcribe what they heard. According to a chart, by the end of the war, 2,237 men and 6,758 women worked at Bletchley Park, and most of those women were under 21 years old.

This book makes all of that fascinating. I liked the short chapters with lots of photographs. Yes, it was hard to keep track of so many characters, but it did give the idea that many young women were working there, doing many different jobs. And they worked in total secrecy, unable to tell their family and friends what important war work they were doing. I was impressed that the Germans never knew that their codes had been broken, and the valuable intelligence gathered definitely helped win the war. I now very much want to visit the Bletchley Park Museum some day.

This book is written for kids ages 8 through 12, and I think older kids (and adults like me) will be intrigued by this story of ordinary young women using their talents to win a war.

candacefleming.com
scholastic.com/ScholasticFocus

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Childrens_Nonfiction/enigma_girls.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.

What did you think of this book?