Flood Friday

To all the flood children

with love

Excerpt from
Journey Into Childhood
, an Autobiography by Lois Lenski

Foreword

1 Rising Water

2 Air Rescue

3 School by Day

4 Still at School

5 School by Night

6 Haven of Refuge

7 New Clothes

8 Clean-Up Time

A Biography of Lois Lenski

T
HE BIG EVENT OF THE
1940s was the award of the Newbery Medal to
Strawberry Girl
in 1946. No one was more astonished than I to receive it. Had it been given to my book
Indian Captive, the Story of Mary Jemison
, which I considered my major and most scholarly work, I would not have been surprised. I had envisioned a series of Regional books, for I knew there were many regions little known and neglected in children’s books. The series was barely started, and I had already daringly broken down a few unwritten taboos, I had written more plainly and realistically than other children’s authors, I had taken my material and my characters direct from real life instead of from the imagination, and my Regionals were not yet entirely accepted or approved. I was an innovator and a pioneer in a new direction, and I knew I had a long and difficult task ahead to earn the acceptance which I was not expecting so soon. But the award focused national attention on
Strawberry Girl
and the books to follow, so I was very grateful.

The convention of the American Library Association was held at Buffalo that year, and at various meetings and receptions, I received invitations from librarians to go to many parts of the country—Seattle, Utah, California, Kansas, Texas, Oklahoma, Minnesota—to write about their region. Afterwards, the award brought much publicity, including requests for personal interviews and radio appearances, for personal appearances at libraries and schools, most of which I was unable to accept. Those that I did accept were strenuous and wearing, and I was glad when the flurry subsided, and I could retire to private life again.

An entire book could be written about my experiences in other regions during the 1950s—in San Angelo, Texas, for
Texas Tomboy
, in Perry, Oklahoma, for
Boom Town Boy
, in McLaughlin, South Dakota, for
Prairie School
, in Remsen, Iowa, for
Corn Farm Boy
, and other places. The list goes on and on, always a new environment and way of life to be studied, and always good people who shared the intimacy of their lives with me, each region more exciting and stimulating than the last, each region calling for one’s deepest powers of observation, understanding, and compassion.

As soon as I return from a region, I have a big job to do. I have to copy all the notes I have taken, classifying them under various headings, making them readily and quickly accessible. Then I make an outline for my story, listing the various incidents I wish to include under the different chapter headings. I write my text in longhand first, and often revise it in longhand, then revise again as I type it. (The subject has, of course, been approved by the editor in advance.) I send the typed manuscript in, to be read and approved, copyedited (improving or disapproving of my punctuation!) and sent to the printer to be set into type. If any changes are suggested by the editor, the manuscript or portions of it may be returned to me for this purpose. If any changes in format are contemplated, I am always consulted. For many years, with Lippincott, I worked directly with the head of the manufacturing department in planning all details of type and format. It was in this way that a beautiful format was devised for the Regionals.

While the manuscript is at the printers, while I am waiting for the galley proofs, having kept a carbon of the manuscript, I am working on the illustrations. For the Regionals, these are graphite pencil drawings on 3-ply Bristol board, and are reproduced by high-light halftone offset. The drawings for the Roundabouts are ink drawings, reproduced by letterpress.

When the galley proofs reach me, two sets are sent, one for me to read and correct, and to answer editorial or printers’ queries; the other set for me to cut up and paste into a blank dummy, allowing space on the proper page for each illustration, of which I usually make about fifty.

After I wrap up a large package containing original manuscript, the original illustrations, corrected galley proofs, and the printer’s dummy and ship it to the publishers, my work on a book is finished. The rest is up to the publisher. I see and hear nothing more until months later, when a book package arrives out of the blue, containing the first copy, hot off the press, for me to hold in my hands and marvel at. There is no other thrill so great for an author-illustrator as seeing the first copy of a book he has labored over and believed in and deeply loved.

From
Journey Into Childhood
by Lois Lenski © 1972 by permission of Sterling Lord Literistic for the Lois Lenski Covey Foundation, Inc.

“O
UR HOUSE WENT.”

“A knock came at the door. I was so scared, I was shaking.”

“I saw the neighbor kids in the water, going down and coming back up.”

“My mother felt bad. She lost her big Bible.”

“I never saw our house after it went, but my father did. The water took it away at nine in the morning. It went floating down the street. The nails fell out and it broke in pieces.”

Such words from the lips of children convey the full meaning of the flood tragedy, which struck Connecticut on Flood Friday, August 19, 1955. Such words, too, convey their innate stoicism and courage, their acceptance of the inevitable, and their resilience in the face of danger.

Thousands of children in the United States have lived through major floods in the last decade. Not only those in Connecticut and adjoining states, but along the Ohio, Mississippi and Missouri rivers, and in California and Texas, children know what floods mean. This book is for them, and for all those more fortunate children who can share
their
experiences only through books.

In October after the flood, a little girl in Ohio wrote me:

“I have an idea for a book of yours. It would be about the horrible flood! How one family was rescued and what happened to them or if they were hurt.”

I am grateful to her, and to the children of Union School, Unionville, Connecticut, who invited me to come to write of their experiences. Living in the heart of the flooded area of Connecticut, I felt a compelling urge to write this book.

Lois Lenski

“I
’M HAVING CHOCOLATE NUT
,” said Barbara Boyd.

“I’ll take strawberry,” said Sally Graham.

“Vanilla for me,” said Sally’s sister Karen.

The three girls were perched up on stools at the soda counter. They began to sip their ice cream. Sally watched the people coming in.