Category Archives: MG (grades 2-6)

188C: searching for remembered anthology

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I am looking for a favorite children’s book. Here is all I remember about it:

1) I think it was a Reader’s Digest anthology, but since I have not been able to find it, perhaps it was another common name from the time that sponsored the collection.

2) I believe the cover was blue–but I could be completely wrong about that.

3) I am quite sure that it was at least 9×12, possibly 10×14. It was large enough that I recall the depth of the book (spine width) being only an inch and looking thin in comparison with the rest of the book.

4) I read it between the ages of 6-12 (1960-1966).
5) The stories had enough words that they were either directed toward young adult readers (high school) or junior high.

6) My most compelling memories are of two stories in the anthology:

The first was about a family crossing the desert in the American southwest. Their car broke down and they had to survive by collecting condensation on parts of their car, which they dismantled. They also created signage so that a plane could see them.

The other story was about a pony or colt with a broken leg. The family suspended the colt in a hammock while its leg healed. The vet had told them it would never work, but it did.

187G: BURNING TOE BURIED IN TOBACCO TIN

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This is a children’s book that was read to us in class during the mid-1970s, and I think it was more contemporary. It was humorous tales of mountain life. I believe it was from the perspective of a young boy. It is a collection of humorous short stories. In one of them, one of the characters gets his toe gets lopped off by an axe. The toe is buried in a tobacco tin. The amputee is tormented by burning sensation where the toe used to be. He believes it is burning because the tobacco is irritating the severed toe, so the boy has to find the tin, rinse the tobacco off. They do, and coincidentally (?) his pain is relieved.

187F: KIDS FIND SECRET ROOMS AND TREASURE IN OLD HOUSE (Solved)

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This is a children’s book that was read to us in class during the mid-1970s, but I felt it was from an earlier era. A family moves to the country, moves into a big, old, dusty, neglected house. There is a solid wood table that they sand and polish with linseed oil. I think there is a scene where the children explore a sealed-off hallway by climbing in through an outdoors upstairs window. I think one of the kids has some chocolate with them and they eat it and they are very thirsty but there is no water, but they quench their thirst by leaning their head out the window and drinking rainwater from a busted downspout. Maybe in the same book they find some old jewelry in a secret compartment behind a medicine cabinet?

187E: KIDS SKIP SCHOOL IN TROPICS FOR A YEAR (Solved)

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This is a children’s book that was read to us in class during the mid-1970s, but I felt it was from an earlier era. In it, a brother and sister leave school and join their father and his friend (a man) on a yacht in the tropics for a year. Their father’s friend acts as a tutor. They do their lessons on ship. They swim in the sea and eat breadfruit. I was impressed at how mature and capable and adventurous the kids were.

186F: children’s magic spells book

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It might have been either a Scholastic or Weekly Reader children’s book, from either the late ‘60s or early ‘70s; but I might have just stumbled onto it in a random store.
I think it was a small, thin, hardcover book with a primarily medium-blue cover.
I think it had a relatively simple title, like Magic Spells and Potions, or something like that, but I can’t remember.

What I do remember clearly is my favorite spell in the book, which involved going into the forest and finding fern “seeds” with which to acquire the power of invisibility.

186E: Clue Embedded In Turquoise Jewelry

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I read this book in maybe 1980-81, it was my favorite ever! It was a young adult book, the main character was a girl going to spend time at her aunt’s? after the death of her father. The aunt had either a hotel or ranch in the desert, somehow horses were involved (either belonging to the aunt, or a neighboring ranch). The girl befriended the daughter of one of the aunts employees (who wasn’t nice to her at first) and would ride horses (there may have been a ranch hand named Jasper?). There was a treasure involved as well……. Her father had given her a turquoise ring or beads (I can’t remember which), and somehow the clue to the treasure was embedded in the jewelry, maybe micro dots ? The girls returned from a ride to find that a burglary had occurred but the jewelry wasn’t taken as she had left it casually on the dresser “hidden in plain sight”. The book was a turquoise colored hardback, and I think it was in the “A-B” section of the childrens library. I have been searching for YEARS to find this, I have a great memory and I can’t believe I can’t remember this book as I read it over and over again! Help!

186D: Life of a Jewish girl in a turn-of-the-century Russian village – NOT “Letters From Rivka!”

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Book was on the life of a young Jewish girl (possibly named Rifka) in either the late nineteeth or early twentieth-century Russia. She either took care of, or had a family/pet goat that she tended. I remember descriptions of the family/villagers going to the river to bathe and wash clothes; all the men would go to one area and the women to another so that they would not see each other.
Another part of the book described a non-Jewish peasant friend warning the family of an impending pogrom, and the family boarded themselves up into their house and waited it out, frightened of the noises they heard outside. This is not “Letters From Rivka.” I thought the book might be called “Rivka” but I can’t find any info! I read this in the 1970’s, and it was a softcover book.

 

185D: Creative Siblings on the HomeFront (solved)

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children during one of the great World Wars (probably ww2) spend a summer playing together. They put on a play, make the costumes out of cheesecloth. They also gather scrap metal for recycling and buy war stamps. They are living in a very old and large rambling house. One day they discover that the peeling wallpaper in a little used empty room is covering old newspaper clippings so they decide to peel more off to investigate. It turns out the entire room was once papered with newspapers. I have no memory of the title, just these random slice of life events. I don’t think there is much of a plot beyond these.

185B: Fox in a Box hunted by Joe (solved)

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My entire family thinks I’m crazy now. Was challenged by one of those ‘name 10 books that have stayed with you’ and could not think of the name of a children’s picture book that we read almost daily when I was growing up.

The book included the rhyme: A hunting we will go, a hunting we will go,
We’ll catch a fox and put him in a box,
And then we’ll let him go!

But I do not think it included the remainder of the rhyme, only that part with the fox in the box. As I recall the cover of the book was green, and about 1/4 to 1/2″ in depth. Maybe 12″ in length, and 10″ in height. Probably published in the 1960s, because it was something I learned to read as a child.

The plot of the book was that Joe wanted to go fox hunting, catch a fox and put him in the box, and then let him go. I believe, he was going to hunt the fox with a bow and arrow, and did shoot the fox in the leg with the arrow. He put the fox in the box, and the fox pleaded with him to remove the arrow and let him go, as Joe promised. But Joe wanted to keep the fox. Ultimately, the fox was let go.

I always thought the book was called Fox in a Box, but cannot find it under that name. It was definitely not a Dr. Seuss book.

Would be awesome if you could find this book.