Evening star., 1941-11-02
Youth Finds Adventure Visit East African Por
| Just
| Between
Yourselves
BY Philip II. Love
Junior Star Editor.

YOU like it we'll enough to want to
read it again sometime? And dc
YOU think you will continue to re-
member 1t with pleasure, say, Is
years from now?
The questions are prompted by
the fact that today is the beginning
of the 23d annual Children's Book
Week. In an effort to write col
umn suitable to the occasion, l
have been trying to recall some OF
the books l enjoyed from Is to Is
years ago. And I have just made
the rather startling discovery that
only a few of my childhood favorltes
have retained any vividness in my
memory, and of these not more than
A half dozen have seemed to me to
merit a second reading.
NV first books were the ones /
received for Christmas. They must
have been pretty dull things, for
though I remember finding many OF
them among my gifts each year, I
don't recall any that ever read. I
think 1 must have saved them for
later use as presents for some OF my
cousins.
The first book of which I have
any real recollection was called
"Peck's Bad Boy Sister Justina,
who taught me from the first grade
through the fourth, used to read 1t
to her classes as reward for good
behavior. Whenever her pupils fell
down in their studies, became too
boisterous or otherwise displeased
her, she would frown: "All right
no rPeck's Bad Boy this week"
And, nearly always, the results were
magical.
Sister Justina's boys and girls
also learned about The Adventures
of Tom Sawyer" and "Huckleherry
Finn" from her. She read weekly
installmentS of them after she mad
taken her classes through the hilar-
ious misadventureS of Mr.. Peck's
young rascal. And the immortal
Mark Twain was, I believe, the most
effective policeman ever recruited
for service in classroom.
I have read many other books
since then-more than l can even
begin to recall-but none that
brought me quite so much pleasure
as the Sawyer and Finn classics.
In fact, only one other book stands
out in my memory with anything
like equal vividness. and that is Rob-
ert Louis Stevenson's Treasure
Island" And that, come to think
of it, is probably because I have
re-read it almost as many times as
I have the Twain works.
Other favorites of my boyhood
we're the books of G. A. Henty, H.
NJ. Tomlinson, Ralph Henry Barbour,
H. Irving Hancock, Archibald Lee
Fletcher, Daniel Carter Beard, and,
of course, the inescapable Horatio
Alger, jr The Henty and Tomlin-
son works have not stayed in my
memory, but I recall that Mr. Bar
bour specialized in stories of the
athletic heroes of prep school
named Yardley Hall. Mr.. Hancock,
I believe, was the author of a
Grammar School Boys" series
which. incidentally, took its heroes
through college, and, for all know,
may still be recounting their ad-
ventures in the practice of law
or medicine or something. Mr.
Fletcher wrote set of Boy Scout
books that we're all the rage for a
while, and Uncle Dan" Beard spe-
cialized in woodcraft and the like
In those days. I suppose, every boy
(and no doubt many girls, too,
though feminine tastes ran more to
Elsie Dinsmore" and the Five
Little Peppers') read the Alger
books. I wonder If they are read
by anybody today?
Looking back over the preceding
paragraph. find that forgot to
mention the Rover Boys" series.
The name of the author escapes me,
but the books were among the best
of their type. I wonder how many
of today's boys and girls have fol-
lowed the adventures of Tom, Dick
and Harry Rover?
The Frank Merriwell" books also
were popular when l was a boy,
but I never cared for them. To my
mind, Frank was just simply too,
too wonderful.
Offhand, 1 can think of only one
of my favorite heroes who is still
chasing adventure after all these
years-'Tarzan." And, apparently,
he is just about as popular today
as he was when I first made his
acquaintance more than a score of
years ago.
But when I started today's COL
umn, my thought was that the test
of a book is whether or not it will
bear rereading and how firmly it
plants itself in the memory of the
reader. And I wonder how many
of the books that are popular to-
day will meet that test as well as
the ones mentioned above?
OF the many boys and girls
books that have crossed my desk
so far this year these have i'm
pressed me most favorably:
Fiction -"Painted Arrows" by
Mary Weekes (NelsonD: "The
Young Patriot" by Marjorie Hayes
GippincotD; MY Dear Patsy" by
Ann We'll (Bobbs- MERRILL; Peter
and Cynthia" by Grace Irwin
Nothrop; Gay Kilties of Cape
Breton" by Amy Hogeboom Dut-
tom: THE Secret of the Old
House" by Margaret Leighton
(Winston); "1n Lightning or ir
Rain" by T. Morris Longstrett
(Appleton-Century).
Non fiction - Ben Franklin
Printers Boy" by Augusta Steven
son (Bobbs MerrilD: George
Washington's World" by Genevieve
Foster (Scribner); "The Child's
Book of the Symphony" by Kath-
leen Carnes and Jerry Pastene
(Howell, Siskin): "Sky High" by
Edith Thacher Hurd Uothrop)
yankee Shippers to the Rescue
by Felix Rosenberg, jr. Dodd
Mead; Curtain Calls for Franz
Schubert" by Opal Wheeler and