Reviewed by Deborah Menkart Review Source: Teaching for Change Book Author: This picture book for mid- to upper-elementary tells the story of Lilly Ann Granderson, an enslaved woman who taught hundreds of people in Kentucky and Mississippi to read. Her schools were held in secrecy and under threat of severe punishment. Readers learn not only […]
Never Caught, the Story of Ona Judge
Reviewed by Anndee Hochman Review Source: Broad Street Review Book Author: The summer I was 12, I spent weekday mornings on the tennis courts at Friends Central School in Wynnewood, swinging a clumsy backhand and counting the minutes until lunch. Each afternoon, I parked myself under a maple tree and devoured Gone with the Wind while sipping a […]
Before She Was Harriet
Reviewed by CCBC Review Source: Cooperative Children’s Book Center Book Author: The skillful narrative’s imaginative and effective structure, in which Tubman’s life unspools from old woman back to childhood, allows the child audience to build on prior knowledge and emphasizes Harriet’s agency throughout her life. The many facets of Tubman’s life and the many roles she […]
Unspoken: A Story from the Underground Railroad
Reviewed by CCBC Review Source: Cooperative Children’s Book Center Book Author: Black pencil illustrations on buff-colored pages detail a wordless story set during the Civil War. A quilt with the North Star pattern hung on a rail fence comprises the opening page spread, which is followed by a scene showing Confederate soldiers riding across a field bordering […]
Crossing Ebenezer Creek
Reviewed by Deborah Menkart Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author: This is an extraordinary book of historical fiction about the December 9, 1864 Massacre at Ebenezer Creek, where, on the march to Savannah, thousands of African American families who had just escaped from slavery were left to drown by Sherman’s Army. The protagonist of the book […]
Mumbet’s Declaration of Independence
Reviewed by Allyson Criner Brown Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author: Mumbet’s Declaration of Independence gives young readers a slavery-to-freedom narrative that is clever, honest, and age appropriate. Gretchen Woelfle’s recounting of Elizabeth Freeman’s true story of resistance and liberation is smartly written and beautifully illustrated. Readers are introduced to Mumbet, a Black woman enslaved in […]
