Follow The Drinking Gourd

Illus. in full color. "Winter's story begins with a peg-leg sailor who aids slaves on their escape on the Underground Railroad. While working for plantation owners, Peg Leg Joe teaches the slaves a song about the drinking gourd (the Big Dipper). A couple, their son, and two others make their escape by following the song's directions. Rich paintings interpret the strong story in a clean, primitive style enhanced by bold colors. The rhythmic compositions have an energetic presence that's compelling. A fine rendering of history in picturebook format."--(starred) Booklist.

Peg Leg Joe travels from plantation to plantation singing the Drinking Gourd song that will guide slaves to freedom in the North.

The stars of the Big Dipper have led a runaway slave family to Deacon Fuller's house, a stop on the underground railroad. Will Tommy Fuller be able to hide the runaways from a search party -- or will the secret passengers be discovered and their hope for freedom destroyed?

Humankind has had a long and intimate association with gourds, and one of them, the bottle gourd, or calabash, may have been man's first cultivated plant. Although grown in the United States today primarily as ornamentals, in other parts of the world gourds have many other important uses. With charming text and stunning black-and-white photographs, The Gourd Book provides fascinating scientific information and folklore about these remarkable plants and keys for identifying species. The first part of the book deals with tree gourds, widely used as containers and for decoration; the Cucurbita gourds, including the buffalo gourd, the Turk's turban, the silver-seed gourd, and the Malabar gourd, all utilized as food, and the beautiful ornamental gourds; the loofah gourds, popular as cosmetic sponges; minor gourds, such as the snake, wax, bitter, teasel, and hedgehog, sometimes used as food or medicine; and gourds mentioned in the Bible. The second part takes up the bottle gourd, which has been used for thousands of years. Even today this gourd is almost indispensable in many parts of the tropics, where species are used to make containers, musical instruments, and clothing, as food and medicine, and in art. The book concludes with a discussion of the gourd in folklore and myth and an appendix on growing, hybridizing, and preserving gourds for decoration. Delightfully written for general readers, this book will also appeal to botanists, anthropologists, horticulturists, and everyone interested in plants or gardening.

Enslaved African Americans longed for freedom, and that longing took many forms—including music. Drawing on biblical imagery, slave songs both expressed the sorrow of life in bondage and offered a rallying cry for the spirit. Like a Bird brings together text, music, and illustrations by Coretta Scott King Award–winning illustrator Michele Wood to convey the rich meaning behind thirteen of these powerful songs.

Imagine leaving everything you’ve ever known—your friends, family, and home—to travel along roads you’ve never seen before, getting help from people you’ve never met before, with the constant threat of capture hovering over your every move. Would you risk your life on the Underground Railroad to gain freedom from slavery? In The Underground Railroad: Navigate the Journey from Slavery to Freedom, readers ages 9 to 12 examine how slavery developed in the United States and what motivated abolitionists to work for its destruction. The Underground Railroad was a network of secret routes and safe houses operated by conductors and station masters, both black and white. Readers follow true stories of enslaved people who braved patrols, the wilderness, hunger, and their own fear in a quest for freedom. In The Underground Railroad, readers dissect primary sources, including slave narratives and runaway ads. Projects include composing a song with a hidden message and navigating by reading the nighttime sky. Amidst the countless tragedies that centuries of slavery brought to African Americans lie tales of hope, resistance, courage, sacrifice, and victory—truly an American story.

"Gail Nelson is an unobtrusive narrator who lets Harriet Tubman's deeds and personality speak for themselves. And speak they do!" - AudioFile

"Using the alphabet to introduce its contents, this book includes topic such as abolitionists, cowboys, Harlem Renaissance, and Kwanzaa"--Provided by publisher.

A stirring, dramatic story of a slave who mails himself to freedom by a Jane Addams Peace Award-winning author and a Coretta Scott King Award-winning artist. Henry Brown doesn't know how old he is. Nobody keeps records of slaves' birthdays. All the time he dreams about freedom, but that dream seems farther away than ever when he is torn from his family and put to work in a warehouse. Henry grows up and marries, but he is again devastated when his family is sold at the slave market. Then one day, as he lifts a crate at the warehouse, he knows exactly what he must do: He will mail himself to the North. After an arduous journey in the crate, Henry finally has a birthday -- his first day of freedom.

In the dark of the night a Barefoot, an escaped slave, flees for his life. With his pursuers close behind and the moon shrouded in clouds, Barefoot must rely on the wisdom of the wild animals of the forest and swamp to guide him to the safety of the underground railroad. Innovative perspective and use of light and a spare text result in an unforgettable portrayal of one slave's journey to freedom. "Another outstanding collaboration from the duo responsible for Some Smug Slug."—starred review/School Library Journal