Author Archives: admin

297Z: The clown who had to become a ditch-digger

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In the early 1950s, I had a children’s picture book about eight by ten inches concerning a clown who was forced to leave the circus.  I can’t recall why he had to leave, but he had done something wrong.  What lingers in my memory is a closing illustration of the clown, dressed in a blue clown suit, oversized shoes, red wig and nose, walking down a road with a pick and shovel over his right shoulder, perhaps into the setting sun, though I’m not sure of that detail.  He had to leave the circus and become a ditch-digger.  I thought it was the saddest image I had ever seen and the saddest fate I could imagine.  I still think so.

297Y: Incompetent burglars and a streetcar/diner

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In the early to mid-60s, I read a hardcover library book that I guess was published either late 50s or early 60s.  It was about a boy, I think his name was Charlie. He lived in a town where an old streetcar had been turned into a restaurant, so you could eat your meal while riding around the town.  And somehow he got mixed up with some incompetent burglars, who couldn’t get the slang term for “gun” right; instead of saying “gat,” they would mangle it somehow. I’m pretty sure Charlie had a large dog.

297X: Secret Code, Tunnel To Underground Station

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I read this in the late 1950s or early 60s. Two or three children are sent to stay at a relative’s or ancestor’s house. The plot involves solving a code in which vowels are rearranged or relocated so that “Underground Station” encodes as something like NDRGRND STTN. The message and the plot involve a tunnel, the ends of which are called underground stations.

297W: The Fastest Little Craft Afloat

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I’m looking for a poem from the 1980s.  Here’s what I remember:

One day mommy brought me a treat

and I asked her if it was something to eat

or is it round and can I bounce it on the ground

No my dear she said to me

its neither and she let me see

and there inside the the wrappings lay

a sailboat for which to play

? – something about bringing it down to the pond

the fastest little craft afloat

 

Thank you!!

297U: Buster Hard Rocks and Tilly Fields

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My inquiry is about an old story that a dear friend told me.  She was born in the 30s and, I believe must have heard the story when she was young.

She thinks it was in a book of children’s stories.  It is about Buster Hard Rocks and Tilly Fields.  The moral of the story is how difficult it is to grow and prosper crops or other things you are growing when all you have in your field are hard rocks.  But if your field is easily tilled, then you can grow crops.  Then similarly in your life, the condition of your heart and mind can be difficult to cultivate if you are hard and unwilling to listen and be persuaded.

I would love to find a copy of a book with this story in it.

297T: Illustrated Children’s book with the theme ” You can choose”

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Illustrated Children’s book with the theme ” You can choose”. We had this book in the late 1980s/ early 1990s. It was square with a yellow hardcover with a cartoonish girl/boy on it. Book was about 20 pages ( 10 layouts with different scenes where the boy and girl make different choices between colours and objects etc. ). Each scene ends with a phrase similar to ” You can chose”. Very repetitious. One scene has them in a classroom. Size of book 20cm x 20cm. I know it is not the following books “If I could choose” or “Which one would you choose”.

297S: Star-Shaped Key (Solved)

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I am looking for a book targeted at, I think, 10-to-12-year-olds, which I suspect was published between 1965 and 1980.  I think the protagonists were a brother and sister who for some reason were spending some months (summer vacation?) in a remote location, which I believe was mountainous.  The permanent inhabitants were faced with a problem that I do not remember but which I believe involved water.  A recurring plot point was that the young boy was taught to play draughts and was challenged to improve–this name for the game may mean that, though I read the book in a U.S. library, it was a British book.  The problem was solved through the use of a key with a star-shaped end which was inserted into a rock face and turned.

As a final detail, I believe the cover of the book was mostly a picture, drawn in blue and white.

297R: Big book of stories, almost like a telephone book

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I am looking for a big book of stories I enjoyed as a child in the early to mid 1980s. It’s possible the book was published in either the 70s or 80s. It is NOT the typical hardcover collection of stories but rather a paperback, rather oversized book – almost like a telephone book with same type of “newspaper like” pages and black and white print. A distinctive feature is that it had pastel multicolored sections of pages inside. Each color represented a specific type of story like yellow for fairy tales, pink for animal stories, blue for classics adapted for kids, etc. The most specific story I remember is the 12 Dancing Princess who wore out their shoes. It had beautiful illustrations with ladies sporting the French pompadour style with ringlets hairdos and full ballroom dresses. I also have a vague memory of a cute little story featuring a ladybug and other various insects conversing with each other. We also had a similar type big book of jokes (featuring different types of jokes including Tom Swifties!) that I seem to remember having a mostly white cover; I always thought they were part of a series of big books but I could be wrong.

Thanks for any help.

297Q: Like a Canadian Little House on the Prairie

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1950s (or earlier) Canadian series about a family.

My mother is looking for a series she read in the 50s but she doesn’t know whether it was published for her generation (born in the 40s) or the books were from her mother’s childhood. They seemed pretty contemporary however. She grew up in Canada and the books were all set in Canada.

The main characters were a boy and a girl, possibly twins. There may have been additional siblings. They moved a lot and each book took place in a new town, much like Little House. Their father may have worked for the government. Or possibly he just was sent many places and they regularly visited him.

One book took place in a logging camp with lumberjacks. In another, they moved to Montreal and dealt with the language barrier, being English-speaking. She particularly remembers them having trouble figuring out the French labels for hot and cold on bathroom sink faucets.