Happy Memorial Day

Since today is Memorial Day, and is a time when we honor those who have fallen while in service to their country, I thought I should do a blog post on those who are connected to my family who have fallen while in the line of duty.  I will not include any other serviceman in my family who died after their active duty service to the country because the day to remember those veterans is 11 November.

CIVIL WAR:

Charles Wesley Chapman, captain of company K of the 63rd Pennsylvania Volunteers.  Killed while on picket 3 March 1862.

While Captain Charles Wesley Chapman was NOT technically a member of my family, he was the namesake of my paternal great-grandfather, as he was good friends with my great-great-grandfather, John Devender Wood.  As a result, I choose long ago to include him in my research and thus he has become an honorary member of my family.  If any of his family is out there and wanting information, I have some!

Flag of the 40th Pennsylvania Volunteers, the regiment in which John W. Strickler fought.  He died in Andersonville Prison as a prisoner of war on 27 August 1864.

Private John W. Strickler was the first cousin of my great-great-grandfather, John Devender Wood.  He was only fourteen when he enlisted in the Civil War, but had lied about his age.  He died at aged 17 in the infamous Andersonville Prison in Sumter County, Georgia.

Private Paul W. Tatem was the brother-in-law of my great-great aunt, Reumah Anne Wood Tatem.  He was part of the 19th Pennsylvania Volunteers and was killed in action on 2 April 1863.  I have no photo of him.

World War One

Preston Ray Roach was a third cousin of my paternal grandfather, Charles William Wood.  He was part of the 319th Infantry of the American Expedition Forces and died in 1918.  I don't have specific information on his death, but I assume he was killed in battle. I do not have a picture of him and am looking for more information on the circumstances of his death.

World War Two

Howard William Young, SSG, gunner and engineer, 442nd Bomb Squadron

Staff Sergeant Howard William Young was the second cousin of my maternal grandfather, Ernest Waldspurger. His plane was shot down over the Mediterranean sea near Ladispoli, Italy on 29 January 1944 and all seven men on board were never recovered.

George D. Shields was a fourth cousin of my father. He was a flight officer with the 85th Squad, 79th Fighter Group in the Army Air Corps. He was killed in action in 1944. I do not have a picture of him and am looking for more information on the circumstances of his death.

Richard Bragg was another fourth cousin of my father.  He was killed in the Battle of Normandy, France on 18 July 1944. I do not have a picture of him and am looking for more information on the circumstances of his death.

Killed While Serving

David Waldspurger, Airman First Class

David Allen Waldspurger was my mother's first cousin.  He was not killed in action for his country, but died in a car accident near his base in Florida on 29 October 1972 at the age of twenty.  I have chosen to include him in this list because he was active duty at the time of his death.

King of the Wind: 1949 Newbery Award

In March of 2014, I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book. A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all. Want to keep track of which books I read? Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause

Sham and Agba: Finding Their Way

"When Allah created the horse, he said to the wind, 'I will that a creature proceed from thee."

Agba is a mute orphan and slave horseboy to the chief groom of the Sultan of Morocco.  His favorite mare has died, so he raises her little colt, a horse the color of gold he names Sham.  Sham soon become the fastest horse in the Sultan's stables and is chosen as one of six Arabians to be given as a gift to the King of France.  But because the horses are small, the King of France sends them away.  Thus begins Sham and Agba's long journey to find greatness in Europe.  They journey to England, where the Earl of Goldolphin lives and become part of his estate.  But can Sham, with the help of the mute Agba, show his potential?

King of the Wind by Marguerite Henry, is based on the real story of the Goldolphin Arabian, who was used in the mid-18th century to help found the modern thoroughbred race horse.   The tale is a fictionalized account of his biography.

The tale reminded me of a cross between Charles Dickens' novel Oliver Twist and Anna Sewell's story Black Beauty.  The tale is the classic story of a bond between a boy and his animal, for better or for worse.  In this case, it is between the beautiful bay horse Sham and the boy who follows him everywhere, Agba.  Agba cannot speak, but he can communicate with Sham in a way in which no one else can understand.  He also learns to understand both English and French in the story, though it is unclear how.  They become impoverished and beaten down, and at one point are left to fend for themselves in the wild, only to have some good fortune smile down on them once more.

I had read a number of Marguerite Henry's books as a fourth grader when I went through a phase where I was horse crazy, but this was the first time reading this particular tale.  While is was a sweet story, it felt a bit contrived for me. The character of Agba seemed to be written into the story to give someone other than the horse the point of view for the story, and it bothered me a bit.  If you love horse and horse tales, this is a good read, otherwise it would bore you a bit.

The Grey King: 1976 Newbery Award Winner

In March of 2014, I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book. A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all. Want to keep track of which books I read? Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

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Will Stanton: The Youngest of the Old

"Yet singing the golden harp shall guide / To break their sleep and bid them ride."

Recovering from a hepatitis attack, young Englishman Will Staton is sent to the Welsh coast to recover at his mother's cousin's home.  He cannot recall at first that he the youngest immortal Old One, servants of the Light that protect the world from the Dark.  When he meets the albino boy, Bran Davies, and his white dog with silver eyes, Cafall, the quest comes back to memory.  Will must find the golden harp that will waken the six sleepers who will partake in the last battle against the Dark, but the Grey King, an agent of the Dark, is working hard to stop him, and the madman Caradog Pritchard, is making things difficult with his stories of sheep-killing dogs.  Can Will find the harp, and why can Bran see and understand the quest Will was given?

Susan Cooper's The Dark Is Rising Sequence is my brother's absolute favorite series of fantasy novels.  But before I read this book for this project, I had not ever read any of the series, of which The Grey King is the fourth book.  While I devoured J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings and C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia and Space Trilogy, I never had a desire to read any of this series because it was something that belonged to my brother.

Like Tolkien and Lewis, Susan Cooper is a wonderful British author of fantasy, and this book is a wonderful example.  While I was a bit lost because I was reading the fourth book in her series, the tales soon captivated me and I was sucked into the land of Wales and an English newcomer to the land.  The story is a good rendition of the battle between the forces of Light and the forces of Darkness.

Anyone who loves Arthurian legends of Briton will enjoy this book, and possibly this series, which I will have to read now.  The Grey King in particular draws from the legends of King Arthur and Guinevere, though I will not give away how that is possible in a book that takes place in 1970s Wales.  

When You Reach Me: 2010 Newbery Award Winner

In March of 2014, I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all. Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

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Miranda : Seeking Answers

"I am coming to save your friend's life, and mine."

It is the school year of 1978 - 1979 and Miranda is twelve years old.  Her best friend since infancy, Sal, has suddenly stopped talking to her and she feels lonely as a latchkey kid.  She relates to the character of Meg from her favorite book, A Wrinkle in Time because she suddenly has no one to talk to and she feels like she doesn't fit in. There is also a mysterious person who is leaving her notes in the New York City apartment she shares with her mother, notes that suggest things about Miranda that no one else knows, things that haven't happened yet.  Who is the mysterious person and what happened to the spare key her mother hid?  Why is there a guy running naked through the neighborhood?  Why does the homeless man on the corner laugh so much and act so weird?  And how is Miranda going to find new friends to replace Sal?

This was a book I had to read twice in a row.  The first time I read  When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead, the pieces hadn't fallen into place until the very end of the book.  I had to reread the story to see how they had fit and to see the events I had missed before in a new light.  This story was very well written and extremely engaging.  

The biggest idea in this novel is the same idea that is in Madeleine L'Engle's novel, A Wrinkle in Time, and that idea it time travel.  Miranda herself wonders about it, as do other characters in the story, and each asks if it could be possible, and how it could work.  Could the homeless laughing man actually be a time traveler or is it just a figment of Miranda's imagination?  

Friendships play a big role in the story.  Sal just inexplicably decides to stop being friends with Miranda on day, which bothers her.  She has to make new friends, which is a difficult thing to do for some.  There is also fellow sixth-graders Annemarie and Julia, who decide one day to just stop being friends in the way that preteen girls do.  Eventually, Miranda comes to realize that in order to make new friends and strengthen old ones, she must grow and learn to emphasize with each of her fellow classmates.

This is a great read, but the concepts are a bit more intellectual and mature than some children can fathom at the suggested fourth grade reading level.

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH : 1972 Newbery Award Winner

In March of 2014, I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause.

Mrs. Jonathan Frisby: A Mouse on a Mission

With her son, Timothy, desperately ill with pneumonia and to frail to be moved, Mrs. Jonathan Frisby, a young widow of a mouse, is frantic.  Spring is creeping in and the farmer will be plowing his garden soon, the garden that was her family's winter home.  Mrs. Frisby must seek the help of the rats who live nearby.  They escaped from a laboratory at NIMH, but can they help save her son?

This was the first of the Newbery Award books that I had ever come in contact with, but it wasn't through a book.  I saw the Don Bluth movie, The Secret of NIMH as a very young child.  I remember it scared me. Let me say this.  If you have ever seen the movie, the book is different.  The book is titled Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH and was written by Robert C. O'Brien.  I like the book much better than the film adaptation, which leaves out a good number of plot development and changes the characters of Nicodemus, Jenner, and Jeremy.

That being said, the book is a good read.  The idea that rats have the intelligence of humans through laboratory testing is plausible, and the story, while whimsical and pastoral, does say much about the idea of animal testing.  

Family and loyalty are big themes of this story as well.  Mrs. Frisby is a widow with four small children, her husband having died the previous year.  She loves her children, who have inherited their intellect from their father, and will do anything to protect them.  The rats also love their families and will protect them, but also honor the loyalty that Jonathan and the mouse Mr. Ages have given to them throughout the years.  They also mourn the loss of part of their colony through schism.  

If you have a chance to read the book, I would highly recommend doing so.  

Sarah, Plain and Tall: 1986 Newbery Award Winner

In March of 2014, I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

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Sarah Elizabeth Wheaton: Plain and tall

Anna and Caleb Witting live a lonely life on the prairie, and have ever since their mother died the day after Caleb was born.  Their father, Jacob, us to be happy, but now he's just as lonely as they are.  So when he places an ad for a bride and a mother in the newspapers back East, they want to know who will answer.  Sarah Wheaton, a plain and tall woman from Maine, answers them.  She soon comes for a month-long visit with her cat, Seal, and the family learns just what a wonderful woman she is.  But will she stay?

This short novella, Sarah, Plain and Tall by Patricia MacLachlan, was perhaps the very first Newbery Award book I ever read.  I loved it then and even recall seeing the movie one day in class.  I loved it again as I read it under the maple tree in the front yard of my apartment building.  It is a touching story about loss.  Anna and Caleb have lost their mother, and fear losing Sarah if she doesn't like living on the prairie.  Sarah misses her brother and the sea, as she lived on the coast of Maine.  But their is also love, and warmth and growth. The story is very short, but the story is sweet and very touching.  

Like Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books, this story touches on the lives of those living on the prairie in the 19th century.  It doesn't sugarcoat the hardships, as there is a death mentioned in the first few pages of the story and a severe storm that comes through the farm.  But there is also strength in its pages, as Sarah and the children learn and grow together.  The story is a great piece of historical fiction and a fast read.

Holes: 1999 Newbery Award Winner

In March of 2014, I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause.

Stanley Yelnats IV: Wrong Kid?

"Stanley was not a bad kid.  He was innocent of the crime for which he had been committed.  He'd just been in the wrong place and the wrong time.  It was all because of his no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing-great-great-grandfather!"

Stanley Yelnats IV lives with a curse that has been in his family for five generations, ever since his ancestor stole a pig and broke a promise.  Convicted of a theft he did not commit, Stanley is sent to  the boys' detention center at Camp Green Lake in Texas, a place that is neither green nor a lake.  Under the watchful eyes of Warden Walker and counselors Mr. Sir and Mr. Pendanski, every boy at Camp Green Lake spends every single day building holes that are exactly five feet deep and five feet high.  It does not take long for Stanley, nicknamed Caveman for his size, and the illiterate inmate, Hector Zeroni, called Zero, to figure out that the Warden is having the boys dig holes so she can find something she has been searching for.  Interspersed in the main story are vignettes about Stanley's ancestors, the story of the curse, and the tale of the famous outlaw Kissin' Kate Barlow.

I have read the story of  Holes by Louis Sachar numerous times and had seen the movie made from the book once.  The book is darkly humorous and filled with many pieces of a puzzle that come together neatly at the end.  It weaves together neatly at the end, much like Jerry Spinelli's works weave a picture that can't be seen until the end. While the ending on Holes is a little ambiguous, it leaves one thinking that good things have happened to the protagonists.

The story is one of redemption.  Stanley, who is described as overweight and friendless, comes to accept his failings and learns that he has a strength of character, and the physical labor of digging the holes strengthens his body as well.  The friend that he makes while at camp, Zero, learns also, as he is taught to read and has an aptitude for numbers and mathematics.   Zero also learns that he is not a nobody, but that someone cares for him, as he has been left behind by everyone and would not be missed if he disappeared, as Stanley looks out for him.

The theme of family is very strong in this work.  Stanley's family, though very poor, is very loving. And determined to make the best of Stanley's stay at Camp Green Lake.  Zero has no family, as his mother abandoned him, and he feels the loss greatly as he wishes for family.  There is also the Yelnats family curse, brought on by the Latvian pig-stealing Elya Yelnats, who is cursed by Madame Zeroni for not fulfilling a promise he made and the family he created with an American woman named Sarah.  Then there is Stanley Yelnats I, who was lost in the desert after being robbed of his fortune and falling in love with a nurse.   The theme of family is also demonstrated by the other boys at the detention center who have their bouts of homesickness and wish to see their own families.

Overall, this is a very well written piece of children's literature and I would recommend it!

Lincoln: A Photobiography: 1988 Newbery Award Winner

In March of 2014, I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause

Abraham Lincoln: A Giant Among Men

"Every man is said to have his peculiar ambition....  I have no other so great as that of being truly esteemed of my fellow men, by rendering myself worthy of their esteem." ~ Abraham Lincoln

The story of the sixteenth president is one of both facts and myth.  Yes, he was an honest man, but he wasn't a perfect man.  Russell Freedman does a great job in this book, Lincoln: A Photobiography of putting down in words and pictures the story of the president who lead the United States through the Civil War.  The words and photographs do justice to a man so steeped in American mythos that he's a modern hero.

This was the first non-fiction work I read for this project.  I enjoyed this book and it was a very quick read for me.  Abraham Lincoln is one of my favorite subjects in history, as he was the president who lead the country through the Civil War (my favorite portion of American history thanks to my father's love of the subject).  I was assigned Stephen B. Oates' Lincoln biography With Malice Toward None: a Life of Abraham Lincoln in college for a history class and required to pick the book apart - Thank you, Professor Edgington!.  I now own a dog-eared copy of Oates' book, as I try to read it once every other year. Freedman's work seemed to be a water-down version of that book, but given the fact that this was written for children, it is a very intelligent book.  Missing are some of the controversies that surrounded Lincoln, and dusted over are the views he had on race. But this book doesn't hold Lincoln up to the hero worship that American society has painted, but rather showed a man plagued by bouts of depression and sadness, a man who lost his mother and sister at a young age and two of his sons before his death, a man who was very insecure of himself because he had very little education and was self learned.  Even if you are an adult, you will appreciate the intelligence with which this book was written.

It is called a photobiography because most of the work revolves around the photos that Russell Freedman chooses to portray.  There are the earliest photos of Lincoln and his family, and the four pictures that were taken of him while he was President that show how he aged.  There are shots from the Civil war itself, and photos of those who worked closely with Lincoln at all stages of his life.   Each photo has its one narrative, and enhance the reading of the book. 

From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler: 1968 Newbery Award Winner

The beginning of March 2014 I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book: used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause

Claudia Kincaid: Looking to Feel Different

"The adventure is over.  Everything gets over, and nothing is ever enough.  Except the part you carry with you."

Claudia Kincaid is twelve-years-old and feeling unappreciated.  She's the eldest child and only girl in a family of brothers, and is sure her parents do things to either harass her or because they know absolutely nothing about the ways of the world.  As a result of this preteen frustration, she decides to run away from home.  She plans out her running away.  First, she will live in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.  Second, she will leave on a Wednesday so she can take her violin case full of clothing.  Third, she will take her second youngest brother, Jamie, because he has a radio and money.  The running away part of her plan goes smoothly, and the two siblings grow close as they transverse the museum.  However, Claudia feels the same as she did at home, as she wanted to feel different as a result of her adventure.  When she and Jamie discover a beautiful angelic statue that has recently been bought by the museum, Claudia becomes obsessed with finding out who the creator was.  Could it be Michelangelo?  That question leads the siblings to Connecticut and to the mixed up file system of the eccentric Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.

E. L. Konigsburg was one of my favorite authors growing up, and to this day I own a good number of her books.  From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler was the book that introduced me to this author.  I fell in love with the book because Claudia's character felt like a kindred spirit when I was a child.  Like Claudia, I wanted to feel different, and like Claudia, it took me awhile to realize that there is mystery in life around me.

That being said, this is a wonderful book from an adult viewpoint as well, as I have reread the book I own after having left it on my bookshelf for about eight years.  The idea that someone will hold on to secrets is one that rings true for adults, especially in this day and age where almost no one has secrets because of the information available at our fingertips.  I also thinks even adults wish they could run away from time to time and live in some place as cool as the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Maniac Magee: 1991 Newbery Medal Winner

The beginning of March 2014 I started a new undertaking: reading every single Newbery Medal Winner book.  A number of them I have read in the past, but I am reading them with fresh eyes,and reviewing them for others. I am not reading them in order, as some will require some effort on my part to find them all.  Want to keep track of which books I read?  Check them out at Confessions of a Wannabe Reader!

Cover of the book - used for identification purposes only under the fair use clause

Jeffery Lionel Magee: The Boy With No Home

"But that's okay, because the history of a kid is one part fact, two parts legend and three parts snowball."

Orphaned and homeless, Jeffery Magee runs to Two Mills, Pennsylvania in search of something.  The town, divided in half by race into African-American East End and Caucasian West End, doesn't know what to make of the twelve-year-old boy, who seems at home with both the Pickwells, a white family, and the Beales, a black family because he is unaware of the racial tensions that surround the town.  Thus, stories are started about him, all based in fact, but capitulated into myths as the stories grow and he is soon given the name Maniac. He is also scorned by some, and makes enemies of Mars Bars Thompson, a African American youth who is the "big cat" in the East End neighborhood, as well as John McNab, a white teen-aged bigot and bully.  But he also has friends in Amanda Beale, a black youngster with a love of reading, and Grayson, the elderly and illiterate white groundskeeper.  Maniac is born of local legend, but was really an ordinary homeless boy longing for a home and a family to call his own.

Maniac Magee was written in 1990 by Jerry Spinelli, an author whose works I happen to love reading.   While it is not specifically stated, this is a historical novel and takes place in the 1950s or early 1960s in Eastern Pennsylvania.  The book focuses on racism and one young boy's reaction to it in a way that is unique.  Maniac, having not realized that he is supposed to be different, embraces everyone in the town as a friend if they treat him right. He also teaches others to do the same, starting with Grayson and Amanda Beale.

I was reminded a bit of the character of Huckleberry Finn from Mark Twain's books as I read this story.  Like Huck, Maniac is searching for his place in the world and is an outsider in the world.  Like Huck, Maniac also doesn't understand the implications of racism as others think he should.  Also like Huck, Maniac moves from place to place, seemingly homeless.  The difference between the two characters, however, is that Maniac would rather have a home than live on his own.

This was a well written book, and I enjoyed it very much.  It was enjoyable reading about the stories surrounding Maniac that became legends and what is hinted to have happened to the town as a result of those legends.