Just as history books and historical fiction loom large on adult best-seller lists, children’s publishing is also getting a blast from the past. Nobody specifically tracks sales of kids’ history books, but publishers and booksellers agree it’s a hot niche, and not the old sanitized version of events. Many of the new books aimed at kids 4 and older take a surprisingly sophisticated look at our world and our heroes, warts and all. “There’s been this amazing leap in the quality and breadth of the topics,” says Ilene Cooper, children’s-book editor for the American Library Association’s Booklist.
Authors are taking on many touchy subjects once thought too controversial for children. “In the ’60s, it was explosive to say America was founded by slaveholders,” says historian Marc Aronson, who has written three books for older children. His “Witch-Hunt” corrects the myth that Tituba, a woman who became a scapegoat during the Salem witch trials, was black. Other new books celebrate black heroes: Lesa Cline-Ransome’s “Major Taylor: Champion Cyclist,” about an African-American biker, and poet Ntozake Shange’s “Ellington Was Not a Street,” about Duke Ellington and other luminaries who gathered in her childhood house.
Several stories frankly tell youngsters that presidents owned slaves and had affairs. In “Thomas Jefferson,” Cheryl Harness writes that evidence now suggests that “in the long years after Martha died, Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson, her owner, produced six children.” In “Lives of the Presidents,” Kathleen Krull reveals that John F. Kennedy and his wife had separate bedrooms and notes that “his frequent extramarital affairs weren’t made public for many years.” Still, there are limits. “You do think about suitability for the audience and how much you need to disclose,” says Cooper, author of “Jack,” about JFK’s childhood. One detail she left out: how Kennedy lost his virginity to a prostitute when he was in high school.
Now kids’ titles generally make an effort to show different sides of a familiar story–sometimes through the eyes of children. Jim Murphy’s “The Boys’ War: Confederate and Union Soldiers Talk About the Civil War” discusses kids who fought for the North and the South. Thomas Allen’s “Remember Pearl Harbor” includes interviews from U.S. survivors and Japanese pilots. Jane Yolen’s “My Brothers’ Flying Machine” highlights the Wright brothers’ sister, Katharine (she ran the family bike shop while they flew).
Because their subjects go beyond the old lineup of white presidents, the new books also sparkle with engaging facts missing in committee-reviewed textbooks. Children bidding farewell to their own baby whites sympathize with Deborah Chandra and Madeleine Comora’s “George Washington’s Teeth,” which recounts how the first president wound up toothless and in dentures made of hippopotamus ivory. Judith St. George’s “So You Want to Be President?” tells kids that William Howard Taft was so fat he needed a supersize bathtub.
While traditionalists bemoan the demythologizing of heroes, children’s-book experts say truth may ultimately be more inspiring than a glossed-over tale. Read-ing about imperfections of famous people gives youngsters more freedom to dream of what they might accomplish. “It’s important for children to know that their heroes were real people,” says author Yolen. “How do you emulate perfect?” A less-than-perfect hero–that’s the real story.
