Category Archives: MG (grades 2-6)

204C: Kids book jokes codes drawings funny stories riddles

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I was born in 1981, and when I was a kid around maybe 4-8 years old I had a book that I took with my everywhere. It wasn’t a novel or story, but a book with maybe a hundred different chapters (each chapter maybe 1-3 pages) of games/puzzles/poems/jokes/riddles/etc. Some of the specific items I remember were codes that you had to read by holding a mirror up to the page. I remember a page with funny looking monster heads. Pages with jokes, etc.

I had a hardcover book with maybe a couple hundred pages, that was outstanding. If my memory is correct the dimensions of this version were about 8 inches tall by 6 inches wide. My version had black and white pages, I don’t recall any color other than the cover. I do seem to recall that the cover has yellow as a prominent color in the design.

This my sound crazy, but I think having that book in my developmental years helped my brain in creating a high level of intelligence. I am about to have a son and would love to be able to give him the same book.

204A: Late 1950’s: kids solve mystery of where to find what is hidden/buried in the old house/building

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I don’t remember really any more than this; once again, the kids were stumped because the map they found had directed them to find what was buried (in the old house/building) in a spot related to a fireplace or chimney in the house; but they couldn’t find what was buried, until they figured out that since the map was drawn, the old house/building had either some of the fireplaces walled off OR some of the chimneys removed (or some interior walls added or removed). Only then were they able to find the right spot to “dig”, to find what was hidden/buried in the house/building.

This book/story was read to my class in the late ’50’s in 4th, or 5th grade.

203F: 80’s Haunted House book..Scholastic or Dell/Yearling? (Solved)

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I’m looking for a kid’s/teen book from the early 80’s. I believe it may have been a Scholastic or Dell/Yearling book, and if I remember correctly it had a yellow cover. It was about a family that puts on a haunted house at their home, and they have the customers put their hands into a hole to feel things (grapes are peeled eyeballs, spaghetti is brains, etc.). I also think they may have hung sheets up to divide the house into walking areas. There is a similar, newer book I found called Tuck’s Haunted House, but the character in that is a pig, and this was definitely a human family. For some reason I remember the name as being like ‘The Millers Haunted House’ or ‘The Wilsons Haunted House’, something with a surname in the title, but I could be wrong. I read it around the same time that I was into Choose Your Own Adventures and Encyclopedia Brown. Thanks for the help 😉

203B: Trouble boy sent to live in cabin removes old man’s appendix with a spoon and knife.

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In 1983 our 8th grade English teacher at Hill Middle School in Denver Colorado read a book about a troubled youth who is sent by his father to live in a remote cabin with an old man. During his stay, the old man becomes ill and has to have his appendix removed. Because of the remote location there is no way to get to a town and/or doctor, so the man makes the boy cut out his appendix while awake lying on the cabin table. I recalled he used a spoon and knife and as an 8th grader it made quite and impression on me. Of course I have searched for this book but have not been able to locate it. Hoping you can help. Hoping you could help me identify the title of this kids novel so I can find a copy.

203A: brother and sister take a train trip

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I am seeking a c. 1930’s-40’s reader, probably about 3rd or 4th grade level, in which a brother and sister take a train trip to visit another boy in the country. An illustration shows them having breakfast on the train. There are eggcups on the table, and the text refers to “freshly squeezed orange juice.” I believe that the cover may have had an illustration with orange detailing and black lettering. The book was a discard, given to me in 1953.

Thanks for any help in identifying this long-lost book.

202C: Haunted house cobbler trap doors girls

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I found the book in question in the children’s fiction shelves of an army post library in the Panama Canal Zone in 1964 or 1965.
The story centered around two girls who explored an old abandoned house in their neighborhood. The house was supposedly haunted; from time to time the “tap-tap-tap” sound of a cobbler’s hammer repairing shoes could be heard.
Eventually, a boy they know decides to enter the house too, but they decide to avoid him and are able to do so by using the numerous trap doors in the house to move around undetected.

202A: The word pepper keeps popping into my head

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I’m looking for a book that I read in elementary school and was (I think) published in the 1980’s. It was a children’s chapter book. It was about a little girl who’s best friend was a boy. She had a crazy or strange family and they lived in a house that had secret hidden rooms or compartments. One of the rooms was soundproof and the girl’s uncle would play drums in the room. In one part of the story the boy and girl get locked(?) or trapped(?) in the soundproof room. Her family may have been spies or something like that. The word pepper keeps popping into my head and I’m not sure if that was someone’s name or in the title. I know it is not the The Five Little Peppers. Help!

201A: Desert fable with two brothers

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I read a fascinating fable as a kid. This was probably 1974-1979. I do not remember the title or author (sorry).
I remember all the details of the plot as I was blown away (remember, I was an impressionable boy!) by the shocking conclusion. Here goes: Two brothers go into the desert to seek their fortune. They come upon a kingdom where everyone wails in grief. They discover the favorite princess is locked in a tall tower and everyone fears she will die there. The brothers are presented before the king and one brother asks, “Do you have a key to this tower.” The king says, “Yes, but I don’t see what good that will do.” The brother requests this key. The two brothers go to the tower, use the key, unlock the door, and the princess is freed! The kingdom rejoices! The king presents each brother with a chest of gold, which they carry into the desert, onward to seek their fortunes.

They arrive at the second kingdom. Terrible dehydration is killing everyone there. One of the brothers asks the king, “Do you have a well? A bucket? A rope?” The king answers, Yes, to all those questions but adds, “I don’t see what good that will do.” The brothers are tight-lipped as to their plan. As one might guess, they tie the rope to the bucket, lower it into the well, and bring up water for all in the kingdom. The kingdom is saved! The king gives each brother a chest of gold.

The story continues this way, the brothers solving what seem to be easily-solvable problems for each kingdom, each time acquiring another chest of gold. After they have each acquired seven or eight chest of gold, they stagger into the desert one more time. Soon, one of the brothers drops dead under the weight of his treasures. His brother is sad but collects all the treasure chests in addition to his own treasure chests and tries to stagger forward. He only gets a few paces before he too succumbs to the weight, has a heart attack, and dies.

A man with a camel finds them, dead in the desert and says something to the effect of, “These two are idiots. If they had only spent a piece or two of gold, they could have bought donkeys to carry all this gold. They wouldn’t have died.”

As a boy, I was stunned that the two main characters died. I was also stunned by the simplicity of the solution to their problem and how I hadn’t thought of it, while I was busy looking down on the idiots in each kingdom, unable to solve their own problems.

I’d really like to see this story again. Made a big impact on me.