Monday, August 13, 2007

Sweet Land of Liberty, by Deborah Hopkinson

Illus. by Leonard Jenkins.

As a child, Oscar Chapman was expelled from school for hanging a picture of Abraham Lincoln in the school. As an adult he was Assistant Secretary of State when Marian Anderson was told she couldn't sing at Constitution Hall and he helps clear the way for her to sing in front of the Lincoln Memorial instead. Interesting back story to the Marian Anderson story presented in picture book format suitable for reading aloud.

Grades 3 up

2 comments:

Brucie said...

Here is another twist to the familiar story of Marian Anderson's famous Lincoln Memorial concert. It will partner well with When Marian Sang (Pam Munoz Ryan and Brian Selznick) and The Voice That Challenged a Nation by Russell Freedman. The illustrations are a bit too surreal for my taste, but kids may like them. The one quibble I have is that Anderson is shown at the concert in a dress.(At least it looks like a dress to me.) In fact she wore a mink coat and a scarf.

Karen Gavigan said...

Second. This would be a good read aloud to help younger children understand civil rights issues. Like Brucie, I am not crazy about the illustrations but the story has a great message. The author's notes provide an interesting look at how the story came to be written.