Grade School Greats

The Witch of Hissing Hill, story by Mary Calhoun and pictures by Janet McCaffery (Weekly Reader Book Club, 1964) I read this book back in Second Grade, and it made an impression on me, so when I started to order books on-line, I sought it out and bought it. Can’t quite explain it. I was always interested in witches as characters (like Witchiepoo), and the redemption of a cranky old witch by the birth of a golden cat in her black cat breeding business was just nice. I like stories about finding the good in otherwise thorny people. Ranking: Keeper. File Code: Children’s Book. Hardback.

Old Black Witch, by Wende and Harry Devlin. Another book to feed my (fictional) witch itch. I first read it at the Seguin Library, sometime in grade school, I believe. Ordered this copy in my old age. I love the artwork, the crisp ink outlines colored so nicely within the lines. There are a couple of sequels. Contains a recipe for blueberry pancakes. Ranking: Nostalgic Keeper. File Code: Children’s Book. Softcover.

The Hungry Thing, by Jan Slepian and Ann Seidler. Pictures by Richard E. Martin. A childhood delight, this Scholastic book was one we got from Weekly Reader’s. Well, not this book, but one like it. The origin of the family phrase, “Stinky Feet Loaf”. This copy bought much later. There are sequels. Ranking: Keeper. File Code: Children’s Book. Nostalgia. Softcover.

Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak. A replacement for the much-battered Weekly Reader book from our childhood. What appealed to me? The cross-hatching of the art, which made it seem textured and weighty, the dreamlike imagery and fabulous creatures, the theatrical staging of each picture, that looked like an unwinding roll of background as the players strolled in front of it. The night sky, the fantastic adventure, all had a visionary feel to it. Years later I bought action figures of Max and all the Wild Things. Ranking: Essential. File Code: Children’s Book. Nostalgia. Softcover.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas, by Dr. Seuss. Dr. Seuss was a fixture for most kids in the 1960’s and 1970’s, and I was no exception. And of course, the animated special didn’t hurt. As a kid of 6 or so I particularly enjoyed the more complicated pictures, crowded with tiny figures and a hundred details for the eye to explore. I liked the pencil-like (crayon?) style, with only shades of red and pink here and there to add emphasis. We never personally had many Seuss books, and I bought this one in the 1980’s and was offended by the exorbitant price of nearly $7! Ranking: Keeper. File Code: Children’s Book. Hardback.

The Visitors from Oz, by L. Frank Baum, Pictured by Dick Martin. The first real sequel to Oz I ever saw, and one of the most popular books at McQueeney. “The Visitors from Oz is a 1960 Oz book, containing material originally written by L. Frank Baum and adapted by Jean Kellogg. It was illustrated by Dick Martin, published by Reilly & Lee. Kellogg took 11 of the 26 stories from the newspaper comic strip Queer Visitors from the Marvelous Land of Oz and recast them into a new form. She also added some material of her own.” – Wikipedia. The illustrations by Martin are superb in my opinion. The page with the Visitors holding up the map of Oz really sticks in my memory. I read this before I read “The Marvelous Land of Oz”, the direct sequel to first Oz book. This ex-library edition is the first book I ever bought using the computer; I located the store in Austin and Mike drove me there (where browsing I also found “Witches, Witches, Witches”, so a double nostalgia score). It fulfilled a childhood dream and a lifelong itch. Ranking: Damn right it’s Essential. File Code: Children’s Book. Nostalgia. Hardback.

The Charles Addams Mother Goose, by Charles Addams. The macabre cartoon artist’s take on classic rhymes. Read this in 2nd Grade, I think, and remember being freaked out by his pictures for “One Misty Moisty Morning”, “Wee Willie Winkie” and “St. Dunstan” with his purple devil (the first time I ever read THAT verse). Depictions of the Devil always scared me when I was little. Got this many years later; it now has a preface by Stephen King. Ranking: Nostalgic Keeper. File Code: Children’s Book. Nostalgia. Hardback.

Walt Disney’s The Adventures of Mr. Toad. Adapted by John Hench with Illustrations from The Walt Disney Studios. A Big Golden Book. “The first seven books on today's list are all copies of books I that loved and that were very influential to me in grade school. I suppose their impact at first was mainly visual: in Grandpa Bunny, the blue shadows on white snow, the autumn leaves in yellow, purple and red; the "solid" warm style of The Adventures Of Mr. Toad; the slick skin of sea monsters that the Darlings evoked just by using pencil. I can point to these books and say "This is where this taste started, here is where I first realized something about what I like," but a sort of mystery remains: why do some things call forth responses from your soul, and not others?” – Power of Babel. Read in 3rd Grade, along with many other good books in Mrs. Davenport’s class. Why did that old witch have such good books? Personal taste, or inheritance? Egad, the wood is so woody in these pictures, the red fabric so plush. Got this copy many years later. Its spine is bad, but I’m glad to have it in any form. Ranking: E-ssential! File Code: Children’s Book. Hardback.