num_pages: 40
description: From a multi-award-winning pair comes a deeply affecting portrait of determination against discrimination: the story of young spelling champion MacNolia Cox.MacNolia Cox was no ordinary kid.Her idea of fun was reading the dictionary.In 1936 eighth grader MacNolia Cox became the first African American to win the Akron Ohio spelling bee. And with that win she was asked to compete at the prestigious National Spelling Bee in Washington DC where she and a girl from New Jersey were the first African Americans invited since its founding. She left her home state a celebrityright up there with Ohios own Joe Louis and Jesse Owenswith a military band and a crowd of thousands to see her off at the station. But celebration turned to chill when the train crossed the state line into Maryland where segregation was the law of the land. Prejudice and discrimination ruledon the train in the hotel and sadly at the spelling bee itself. With a brief epilogue recounting MacNolias further history How Do You Spell Unfair? is the story of her groundbreaking achievement magnificently told by award-winning creators and frequent picture-book collaborators Carole Boston Weatherford and Frank Morrison.
language: English
title: How Do You Spell Unfair?: MacNolia Cox and the National Spelling Bee
publisher: Candlewick Press