Fifty Cents and a Dream

Young Booker T. Washington

This post joins other Nonfiction Monday blogs hosted today
by proseandkahn

and joins It's Monday!

What are you reading?

at Teacher Mentor Texts

Little, Brown Books
(pub. 12.4.2012) 48 pages 

A True Tale with A Cherry On Top

A uthor: Jabari Asim

     and Illustrator:  Bryan Collier

C haracter: Booker T. Washington

O verview from the jacket flap: 

      "Born into slavery, Booker T. Washington could only dream of learning to read and write. After emancipation, young Booker began a five-hundred-mile journey, mostly on foot, to Hampton Institute, taking his first of many steps toward a college degree. When he arrived, he had just fifty cents in his pocket and a dream about to come true. The former slave who once waited outside the schoolhouse would one day become a legendary educator of freedom.
        Acclaimed author Jabari Asim and celebrated artist Bryan Collier capture the hardship and the spirit of one of the most inspiring figures in American history, bringing to life Booker T. Washington's journey to learn, read, and realize a dream."

        

T antalizing taste: 

"Like any boy,
Booker longed to play, run, and jump
beneath the blue skies and bright sun.

Most of all, he longed to learn.
Booker dreamed
of making friends with words,
setting free the secrets 
that lived in books...

Trudging beneath the bleak skies
and bitter cold, he could have given up.
Then he imagined the library at Hampton,
magic and mystery lining its shelves.
From deep inside, he heard a voice
urging him to press on.
He listened, and dreamed."

                       

and something more: I thought Bryan Collier's illustration that portrays Booker T. Washington kneeling and praying is particularly powerful. The background image of trees is filled with images of slaves representing his former older neighbors who told him their stories. The power of dreams, words and communal stories!