Special Collections
Jane Addams Children's Book Award Winners
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Growing Up in Coal Country
by Susan Campbell BartolettiThrough interviews, newspaper accounts, and other original sources, Bartoletti pieced together a picture of life in the Pennsylvania coal mines at the turn of the century.
Kids at Work
by Russell FreedmanLewis Hine's photographs expose the chilling reality of the inhumane working conditions American children endured during the early twentieth century. Hines's photographs of children at work were so devastating that they convinced the American people that Congress must pass child labor laws.
A Long Walk to Water
by Linda Sue ParkA Long Walk to Water begins as two stories, told in alternating sections, about a girl in Sudan in 2008 and a boy in Sudan in 1985.
The girl, Nya, is fetching water from a pond that is two hours' walk from her home: she makes two trips to the pond every day. The boy, Salva, becomes one of the "lost boys" of Sudan, refugees who cover the African continent on foot as they search for their families and for a safe place to stay. Enduring every hardship from loneliness to attack by armed rebels to contact with killer lions and crocodiles, Salva is a survivor, and his story goes on to intersect with Nya's in an astonishing and moving way.
Based on the life of Salva Dut, who, after emigrating to America in 1996, began a project to dig water wells in Sudan.
Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Winner
Sugar
by Jewell Parker RhodesTen-year-old Sugar lives on the River Road sugar plantation along the banks of the Mississippi. Slavery is over, but laboring in the fields all day doesn't make her feel very free.
Thankfully, Sugar has a knack for finding her own fun, especially when she joins forces with forbidden friend Billy, the white plantation owner's son.
Sugar has always yearned to learn more about the world, and she sees her chance when Chinese workers are brought in to help harvest the cane.
The older River Road folks feel threatened, but Sugar is fascinated. As she befriends young Beau and elder Master Liu, they introduce her to the traditions of their culture, and she, in turn, shares the ways of plantation life.
Sugar soon realizes that she must be the one to bridge the cultural gap and bring the community together.
Here is a story of unlikely friendships and how they can change our lives forever.
From Jewell Parker Rhodes, the author of Ninth Ward (a Coretta Scott King Honor Book and a Today show Al's Book Club for Kids pick), here's another tale of a strong, spirited young girl who rises beyond her circumstances and inspires others to work toward a brighter future.
Parvana's Journey
by Deborah EllisIn this sequel to "The Breadwinner, " the Taliban still control Afghanistan, but Kabul is in ruins. Twelve-year-old Parvana's father has just died, and her mother, sister, and brother could be anywhere in the country. Parvana sets out alone to find them, masquerading as a boy, and she meets other children who are victims of war.
With Courage and Cloth
by Ann BausumFor grades 5 and up. With Courage and Cloth tells the story of how women fought for and won the right to vote in the United States. Over the course of seven compelling, fact-filled chapters-"Parade," "Rights," "Momentum," "Protest," "Prison," "Action," and "Victory"-the story of a brave struggle unfolds, showing how women used the democratic system that excluded them in order to become full voting citizens of their nation. The book starts with basic history on the struggle for women's rights, other groups' battles for the vote, and background on the 19th-century women's suffrage movement before focusing on the ultimately successful 20th century efforts to enfranchise women. It details and illustrates the political lobbying and public protests organized by women's groups led by suffragists like Alice Paul and the backlash against these efforts, including intimidation, imprisonment, hunger strikes, and forced feeding of prisoners. The book explains how support for women's suffrage grew, leading to the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1919, and the battle to get it ratified by three-fourths of the nation's 48 states. An afterword includes a discussion of the evolution of voting rights and women's rights since 1920, including the efforts to pass an equal rights amendment. This political struggle for equal rights under the law makes for an exciting story that demonstrates democracy in action and how people have worked to improve the system.
Bat 6
by Virginia Euwer WolffThe sixth-grade girls of Barlow and Bear Creek Ridge have been waiting to play in the annual softball game -- the Bat 6 -- for as long as they can remember.
But something is different this year. There's a new girl on both teams, each with a secret in her past that puts them on a collision course set to explode on game day. No one knows how to stop it. All they can do is watch...
Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Winner
We Are One
by Larry Dane BrimnerBayard Rustin's life was dedicated to helping others-fighting injustices and discriminations-so that people could live as one. Protesting segregation long before there was a civil rights movement, he was often arrested for his beliefs and actions. As an organizer, Bayard was largely responsible for bringing people together to walk for freedom and jobs in Washington, D. C., on that memorable summer day, August 28, 1963.
The Other Side of Truth
by Beverley NaidooWill the truth harm them -- or save them?
When Nigeria's corrupt military government kills their mother, twelve-year-old Sade and her brother Femi think their lives are over. Out of fear for their safety, their father, an outspoken journalist, decides to smuggle the children out of Nigeria and into London, where their uncle lives.
But when they get to the cold and massive city, they find themselves lost and alone, with no one to trust and no idea when -- or if -- they will ever see their father again. The Other Side of Truth is a gripping adventure story about courage, family, and the power of truth.
Weedflower
by Cynthia KadohataTwelve-year-old Sumiko feels her life has been made up of two parts: before Pearl Harbor and after it. The good part and the bad part. Raised on a flower farm in California, Sumiko is used to being the only Japanese girl in her class. Even when the other kids tease her, she always has had her flowers and family to go home to. That all changes after the horrific events of Pearl Harbor. Other Americans start to suspect that all Japanese people are spies for the emperor, even if, like Sumiko, they were born in the United States! As suspicions grow, Sumiko and her family find themselves being shipped to an internment camp in one of the hottest deserts in the United States. The vivid color of her previous life is gone forever, and now dust storms regularly choke the sky and seep into every crack of the military barrack that is her new "home." Sumiko soon discovers that the camp is on an Indian reservation and that the Japanese are as unwanted there as they'd been at home. But then she meets a young Mohave boy who might just become her first real friend...if he can ever stop being angry about the fact that the internment camp is on his tribe's land. With searing insight and clarity, Newbery Medal-winning author Cynthia Kadohata explores an important and painful topic through the eyes of a young girl who yearns to belong. Weedflower is the story of the rewards and challenges of a friendship across the racial divide, as well as the based-on-real-life story of how the meeting of Japanese Americans and Native Americans changed the future of both.
Through My Eyes
by Ruby Bridges and Margo LundellOn November 14, 1960, a tiny six-year-old black child, surrounded by federal marshals, walked through a mob of screaming segregationists and into her school. From where she sat in the office, Ruby Bridges could see parents marching through the halls and taking their children out of classrooms. The next day, Ruby walked through the angry mob once again and into a school where she saw no other students. The white children did not go to school that day, and they wouldn't go to school for many days to come. Surrounded by racial turmoil, Ruby, the only student in a classroom with one wonderful teacher, learned to read and add. This is the story of a pivotal event in history as Ruby Bridges saw it unfold around her. Ruby's poignant words, quotations from writers and from other adults who observed her, and dramatic photographs recreate an amazing story of innocence, courage, and forgiveness. Ruby Bridges' story is an inspiration to us all.
Let Me Play
by Karen BlumenthalIn 1972, Congress passed a modest little law called Title IX, that said any school receiving money from the government couldn't treat boys and girls differently because of their sex. For the first time, girls across the United States got a real chance to play on the athletic field and that little law took on a role far greater than anyone ever imagined it could.
The Well
by Mildred D. TaylorAnother powerful story in the Logan Family Saga and companion to Mildred D. Taylor's Newbery Award-winning Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.
For David Logan, a time of distress means taking the higher road. During a drought, the Logan family shares their well water with their neighbors, black and white alike. But David's brother Hammer finds it hard to share with Charlie Simms, who torments them because they are black. Hammer's pride and Charlie's meanness are a dangerous combination, and tensions between the boys build and build--until they explode.
Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Winner
Turning 15 on the Road to Freedom
by Susan Buckley and Lynda Blackmon Lowery and Elspeth Leacock and Pj LoughranA memoir of the Civil Rights Movement from one of its youngest heroes
As the youngest marcher in the 1965 voting rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Albama, Lynda Blackmon Lowery proved that young adults can be heroes. Jailed eleven times before her fifteenth birthday, Lowery fought alongside Martin Luther King, Jr. for the rights of African-Americans. In this memoir, she shows today's young readers what it means to fight nonviolently (even when the police are using violence, as in the Bloody Sunday protest) and how it felt to be part of changing American history.
Straightforward and inspiring, this beautifully illustrated memoir brings readers into the middle of the Civil Rights Movement, complementing Common Core classroom learning and bringing history alive for young readers.
Winner of the Sibert Honor
Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Winner
Marching For Freedom
by Elizabeth PartridgeAn inspiring look at the fight for the vote, by an award-winning author Only 44 years ago in the U.S., Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was leading a fight to win blacks the right to vote. Ground zero for the movement became Selma, Alabama. Award-winning author Elizabeth Partridge leads you straight into the chaotic, passionate, and deadly three months of protests that culminated in the landmark march from Selma to Montgomery in 1965. Focusing on the courageous children who faced terrifying violence in order to march alongside King, this is an inspiring look at their fight for the vote. Stunningly emotional black-and-white photos accompany the text.
Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Winner
A Song for the Unsung
by Carole Boston Weatherford and Rob SandersA singular, richly illustrated picture book biography of Bayard Rustin, the gay Black man behind the March on Washington of 1963, by the acclaimed authors of Unspeakable: the Tulsa Race Massacre and Pride: The Story of Harvey Milk and the Rainbow Flag.
On August 28, 1963, a quarter of a million activists and demonstrators from every corner of the United States convened for the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. It was there and then that they raised their voices in unison to call for racial and economic justice for all Black Americans, to call out inequities, and ultimately to advance the Civil Rights Movement.
Every movement has its unsung heroes: individuals who work in the background without praise or accolades, who toil and struggle without notice. One of those unsung heroes was at the center of some of the most important decisions and events of the Civil Rights Movement.
That hero was a quiet man, a gay African American man. He was Bayard Rustin.
Carole Boston Weatherford and Rob Sanders's A Song for the Unsung, featuring illustrations from artist Byron McCray, is an inspiring story that answers one of our nation’s greatest calls to action by honoring one of the men who made it happen.
Patrol
by Walter Dean MyersVietnam. A young American soldier waits for his enemy, rifle in hand, finger on the trigger. He is afraid to move and yet afraid not to move. Gunshots crackle in the still air. The soldier fires blindly into the distant trees at an unseen enemy. He crouches and waits -- heart pounding, tense and trembling, biting back tears. When will it all be over? Walter Dean Myers joined the army on his seventeeth birthday, at the onset of American involvement in Vietnam, but it was the death of his brother in 1968 that forever changed his mind about war. In a gripping and powerful story-poem, the award-winning author takes readers into the heart and mind of a young soldier in an alien land who comes face-to-face with the enemy.
Aunt Harriet's Underground Railroad In The Sky
by Faith RinggoldCassie, who flew above New York in Tar Beach, soars into the sky once more. This time, she and her brother Be Be meet a train full of people, and Be Be joins them. But the train departs before Cassie can climb aboard. With Harriet Tubman as her guide, Cassie retraces the steps escaping slaves took on the real Underground Railroad and is finally reunited with her brother at the story's end.
Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Winner
Sitti's Secrets
by Naomi Shihab NyeA young girl describes a visit to see her grandmother in a Palestinian village on the West Bank.
Seven Brave Women
by Betsy Hearne and Bethanne AndersenTake a journey through time as a young girl recounts the exploits of her female ancestors, seven brave women who left their imprints on the past and on her. Beginning with the great-great-great-grandmother who came to America on a wooden sailboat, these women were devout and determined and tireless and beloved.
This Land Is My Land
by George LittlechildArtist George Littlechild shows and tells us what it means to be a young Native artist living on the cusp of the 21st century. Giving thanks to the ancestors who have guided him, he documents the struggles of Native peoples and offers us stories of delight, humor and healing.
Marianthe's Story, Painted Words
by AlikiTwo separate stories in one book, the first telling of Mari's starting school in a new land, and the second describing village life in her country before she and her family left in search of a better life.
Martin's Big Words
by Doreen RappaportThis picture book biography of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. brings his life and the profound nature of his message to young children through his own words. Martin Luther King, Jr. , was one of the most influential and gifted speakers of all time. Doreen Rappaport uses quotes from some of his most beloved speeches to tell the story of his life and his work in a simple, direct way. A timeline and a list of additional books and web sites help make this a standout biography of Dr. King.
Winner of the Caldecott Honor
Jane Addams Children’s Book Award Winner
The Composition
by Antonio SkármetaIn a village in Chile, Pedro and Daniel are two typical nine-year-old boys. Up until Daniel's father gets arrested, their biggest worry had been how to improve their soccer skills. Now, they are thrust into a situation where they must grapple with the incomprehensible: dictatorship and its inherent abuses. "The Composition" is a winner of the Americas Award for Children's Literature and the Jane Addams Children's Book Award.
Wilma Unlimited
by Kathleen KrullBefore Wilma was five years old, polio had paralyzed her left leg. Everyone said she would never walk again. But Wilma refused to believe it. Not only would she walk again, she vowed, she'd run. And she did run--all the way to the Olympics, where she became the first American woman to earn three gold medals in a single olympiad.