Katy Rose Collection: Art, Words
9 Picture Books That Bring History To Life
For over a decade I’ve been reading books to my children, and in the top tier of those I’ve loved have been picture book biographies. Whether you homeschool or just love cuddling up for read-aloud time with your kids, here are nine recommendations for picture books that bring history to life.
Please note, this particular list primarily touches on American and Western European history, and very small slices of history at that. But each book sparks interest to pursue further exploration! I could make about ten more lists of historically-based books we love, and perhaps I will!
The below images and descriptions are drawn from the Amazon pages, to which each book is linked.
Henry’s Freedom Box
by Ellen Levine
Henry dreams of a world where his life belongs to him. But when his family is sold, he risks everything for what he knows is right. With the strength and conviction of the best kind of hero, Henry makes a harrowing journey in a wooden crate - and mails himself to freedom!
Camille and the Sunflowers
by Laurence Anholt
A lovely book about artist, Vincent van Gogh from the series, Anholt's Artists Books for Children. Where Camille lived, the sunflowers grew so high they looked like real suns. One day a man arrived in Camille's town. Camille meets the man, and they become friends. This man is the painter named Vincent van Gogh.
Ordinary, Extraordinary Jane Austen
by Deborah Hopkinson
A gorgeous and inspiring picture book biography of Jane Austen, one of the most beloved writers of all time, from award-winning author Deborah Hopkinson. This nonfiction picture book is an excellent choice to share during homeschooling, in particular for children ages 4 to 6. It’s a fun way to learn to read and as a supplement for activity books for children.
Lilibet the Brave
by Katy Rose
Sweet and sheltered Princess Lilibet finds herself swirling in uncertainty and fear when war breaks out! As she navigates her new reality, longing to be brave (always with an animal by her side), she discovers something about bravery which, in turn, helps shape her historic reign as Queen. This picture book, the first of its kind, brings the historical events of both World War II and the Queen’s childhood to life in an engaging, heartfelt way that will both educate and inspire.
Thank you, Sarah
by Laurie Halse Anderson
Thanksgiving might have started with a jubilant feast on Plymouth's shore. But by the 1800s America's observance was waning. None of the presidents nor Congress sought to revive the holiday. And so one invincible "lady editor" name Sarah Hale took it upon herself to rewrite the recipe for Thanksgiving as we know it today.
Spring After Spring
by Stephanie Roth Sisson
As a child, Rachel Carson lived by the rhythms of the natural world. Spring after spring, year after year, she observed how all living things are connected. And as an adult, Rachel watched and listened as the natural world she loved so much began to fall silent. Spring After Spring traces Rachel’s journey as scientist and writer, courageously speaking truth to an often hostile world through her book, and ultimately paving the way for the modern environmental movement.
Hello Lighthouse
by Sophie Blackall
Watch the days and seasons pass as the wind blows, the fog rolls in, and icebergs drift by. Outside, there is water all around. Inside, the daily life of a lighthouse keeper and his family unfolds as the keeper boils water for tea, lights the lamp's wick, and writes every detail in his logbook.
Ready to Fly
by Lyon and LaFaye
Although there aren’t many ballet schools that will accept a girl like Sylvia in the 1950s, her local bookmobile provides another possibility. A librarian helps Sylvia find a book about ballet and the determined seven-year-old, with the help of her new books, starts teaching herself the basics of classical ballet.
Soon Sylvia learns how to fly—how to dance—and how to dare to dream.
Finding Winnie
by Lindsay Mattick
In 1914, Harry Colebourn, a veterinarian on his way to tend horses in World War I, followed his heart and rescued a baby bear. He named her Winnie, after his hometown of Winnipeg, and he took the bear to war.
Harry Colebourn's real-life great-granddaughter tells the true story of a remarkable friendship and an even more remarkable journey--from the fields of Canada to a convoy across the ocean to an army base in England...
And finally to the London Zoo, where Winnie made another new friend: a real boy named Christopher Robin.
Affiliate links for Amazon included in this post.
Letter from London
As a great lover of history, especially survival stories from the past, I like to imagine myself as the type of person who would persevere under trial, who could outwit a difficult circumstance, or be clever enough to endure in the midst of it. But judging by how I reacted when faced with no phone for four hours in an airport makes me think that perhaps I am not such a person.
As my plane descends over the outskirts of London, past green land and hedgerows, I think, romantically, coming to England strangely feels like coming home.
It is all perfectly dreamy from the air. However, upon landing, bleary-eyed from the overnight flight, I find my phone won’t work despite my pre-planning. My mother and sisters land in a few hours and I had intended to make my way into the city to find a cozy coffee shop to wait with my new book, My Love Affair with England, by Susan Allen Toth. Bliss.
But now with no phone, what actually happens is I sit anxiously in a poorly lit baggage claim area (no coffee or snacks to be found) scanning the arriving passengers for familiar faces, praying that I would happen to see them amongst the thousands of people pouring through. Near their arrival time, I consult an attendant and realize they will probably be landing at an entirely different terminal. I wrangle my baggage and run through halls, up escalators, and onto a train bound for Terminal 3.
Once there, I find a chair directly facing the doors from which they will exit (I hope) and, after catching my breath, open my bag to pull out My Love Affair with England, determined to redeem the wasted hours. It is now I find that I have left my book on the plane.
So, I just sit, head throbbing, heart racing, stomach rumbling, planning what I will do if I don’t ever find my family and never get phone or internet access. (Turns out there are several attainable options, but the part of my brain that is supposed to see me heroically through disasters is inaccessible at the moment).
I try to pull myself together with thoughts of immigrants and refugees who arrive in foreign lands without food, connections, or the ability to communicate. (People with actual problems, you might be thinking.) A line comes to mind from a sermon my husband gave a few years before. He was talking about the role of the Holy Spirit—the Helper, or Comforter— and how we cushion so much of our life that we rarely feel that need, and can miss out on seeing God work. I’m struck by how padded my life is.
I did not leave my journal on the plane, and while I don’t feel I can conjure the mental strength to write, it seems better than staring. I get out my pen and, eyes darting between page and door, recount the events since landing. Within five minutes I detour away from my path toward meltdown, incidentally bolstering the scientific research: journaling enhances mental health, increases self-awareness (or, when one is perhaps being overly dramatic), and helps make sense of life events.
Another hungry hour passes and finally, I see those three beautiful faces pass through the steel doorframe and I holler before they can get carried away by the crowd. I run toward them and we embrace and my sister buys me coffee and I know the trip can only get better from here.
An old journal entry I recently found describes London through my teenage eyes. It was my first time to visit and I was 13.
“It is awesome! Probably the coolest place I’ve ever been in my whole life!”
“We all ran to catch a tour bus… It was so cool. We saw so much stuff like the whole city! We got hot dogs and ate them in the park next to Buckingham Palace!”
According to my journal, after spending a couple days seeing all the sights (like the whole city!), we missed our boat to France but ended up with a better option– an overnight crossing that reminded me of the Titanic, one of my childhood passions.
“The awesome thing was that we sailed away just a few miles from where the Titanic took off and then we went on the same path that it would have sailed on! I thought that was amazing. Almost the whole time I was on it, I was listening to the Titanic soundtrack. It was really neat.”
I’ve never once made an international trip, or any trip for that matter, without several miss-steps and unexpected turn-of-events. But what I have found is that, while extremely uncomfortable in the moment, these are often the stories that are canonized with fondness. Even if an entire trip was riddled with mishaps, we usually look back and recount it with complete delight, at least in my family. Maybe that’s just us, or maybe that’s what’s so great about traveling. The wonder of new discoveries outweighs the inconveniences and discomfort, and we want to go back and do it all over again.
I think it’s marvelous.
A quick rundown of favorites fRom April’s Trip:
Staying in South Kensington and walking its charming streets
Afternoon tea at Dalloway Terrace
Covent Gardens & Seven Dials neighborhoods
Walks through Kensington, stopping for fish and chips at The Mall Tavern, on to Notting Hill
Notting Hill Bookshop, Portobello Rd market
Tea at the Ritz Hotel
SIX, the musical
Kensington Palace and Hyde Park
Buckingham Palace and gift shop
Mayfair Chippy fish and chips eaten in Brown Hart Garden
Ice cream and browsing Fortnum & Mason
Big Ben, Westminster Abbey
Little India, Tikka Masala and naan
Lots of stops for coffee and pastries
Best of all was sitting, chatting, and laughing
with my sisters, mom, waiters and shopkeepers all over the city. What a gift!
Postcards Home
Dear Children,
I made it here to West Virginia! My friend picked me up at the airport in Charlotte, NC, and we began the three hour journey north to Bluefield for the conference. We were having so much fun chatting over lunch, though, that we accidentally missed our first event!
I’ve never visited this part of the country before but it’s happily very much what I imagined, and reminds me of the picture books we’ve always read, When I Was Young in the Mountains and The Relatives Came.
I love you,
Mom
Dear Children,
West Virginia has tree-covered hills with blue mountains behind, but not the rigid mountains like we see in Colorado, but softer. Tucked into the hillsides, as if embraced in a hug, are small towns, old and some a bit rough around the edges, but just bursting with history.
We are staying in the town of Bramwell a few miles outside Bluefield, where the conference is being held. Bramwell’s town sign reads “Home of Millionaires” which was true 100 years ago, but perhaps not today. The house my friends and I are staying in must have been one of the wealthy family’s homes as it sits perched on a hill overlooking the little mainstreet.
I love you,
Mom
Dear Children,
We checked in to our house and snooped around a minute. I was given a choice of rooms but went for the least preferable- small with no bathroom- which will not surprise you as its windows overlooked the town and there was so much “scope for the imagination.” (Anne of Green Gables)
It will also not surprise you to hear I did a small bit of rearranging (put the stuffed monkey and faded fake flowers in the closet) and opened all the blinds, and then sat down to write you this postcard and read a little on the history of the town.
I love you,
Mom
Dear Children,
Bramwell, population 220, was founded around 1880 with the boom of coal mining and soon became the US city with the most millionaires per capita. It has the look of a classic small town: train station, steeples, ice cream shop on Main, and Victorian homes along a brick-paved street.
While reading, I happened upon articles on Anne Spencer, a renowned poet who moved here as a young girl because it was a welcoming place for black people. Her mother did not find the schools suitable for her daughter and Anne was free to roam around town and explore, and apparently learned to read from the Sears and Roebuck catalog in her outhouse. Later on, she and her husband became important members in the civil rights movement and hosted greats like George Washington Carver, Langston Hughes, and Martin Luther King Jr.
It was time for a walk through town so I put away my reading and we headed outside. I looked to the right and there before me was a small footbridge crossing the river, and a sign which read “Anne Spencer bridge.” I know you can imagine my delight at this. Apparently she would run right this way on her explorations. Charming.
I love you,
Mom
Dear Children,
We strolled the brick main street past the train station, the First Presbyterian church, the bank, and the named houses. We stopped at the Honeybee Cafe and left with coffees and slices of lemon loaf.
It was time to head back to Bluefield, about 15 minutes away, for the HopeWords conference.
I’d like to adequately describe this conference and the way I can best think to describe it is like being at my grandparent’s house during the holidays as a girl. Homey, unpretentious, dated in the most comforting way. Baked goodies and warm drinks were set out, prepared by the ladies of the Episcopal church (here, not at my grandma’s). Chatter, laughter, peace. Like someone prepared for you and everything is taken care of.
I love you,
Mom
Dear Children,
You know how we talk about pushing back the darkness with light? How light is stronger than the dark? Well, today I got to hear from writers who are doing that with their words. They are using their gifts to bless others and love God.
Remember how I told you I would get to hear from the author of Bridge to Terbithia and The Great Gilly Hopkins, Katherine Paterson? Wow! She’s 90 years old and wise and witty. Remind me to tell you what she said about Maime Trotter and God.
You know the author of The Green Ember, S.D. Smith? You will be happy to know he used to play soccer. He also said this: “Love and service are better than fame and self-expression.”
I love you,
Mom
Dear Children,
You know Miss Ann, who wrote Your Brave Song (and the other books I love)? She talked about the woman at the well and how brokenness is beautiful Jesus. (Jesus isn’t scared of our mistakes or our struggles. He comes close to us.)
It made me think right then that I wanted to remind you how much Jesus loves you, no matter what.
You know how we talk so often about continuing to practice and pratice to improve at something, and not giving up in the beginning just because we might not do well immediately? Well this was a great speaker named Esau McCaulley who said lots of fantastic things, but I thought of you (and me) when he said, “You have to be a bad writer first!”
You will also be delighted to know I ate a cookie, ice cream, and chocolate candy today. I spent time with a friend who I hadn’t seen in 13 years, sat next to completely new friends at dinner, and got to know a few friends better than I did before. It all felt like a gift to me.
I love you and can’t wait to see you soon,
Mom