Nonfiction Monday

Nonfiction Monday is hosted today by Simply Science.

My selection is "TheCamping Trip That Changed America: Theodore Roosevelt, John Muir, and OurNational Parks" written by Barb Rosenstock and illustrated by Mordicai Gerstein.

Camping is a favorite summer activity for thousands of Americans, but the experience might be very different if this famous get-together between an American President and Eloquent Naturalist hadn't taken place.

Rosenstock introduces readers to this once-in-a-lifetime meeting between Roosevelt and Muir which took place in 1903 is Yosemite Valley.  The narrative is enlivened by invented dialogue based on her research.  She chose to refer to these two respected gentlemen by their childhood names which young readers will find appealing and conveys a sense of the youthful enjoyment that was surely part of an experience that had important long-term consequences.  The four-day adventure  among towering sequoias included a snowstorm and a lesson from Muir on how the valley was created by glaciers.  The result was Roosevelt's return to Washington D.C. determined to protect America's wilderness through the creation of National Parks.

Gerstein, a Caldecott Medalist, provides a lively collection of pen and water-color illustrations that convey the spirit of the trip  through drawings that feel as if they might have been sketched in a naturalist's notebook.  Gerstein's imaginative use of perspective and point of view provide readers with a sense of the grandeur and breath-taking scale of the natural world these two men encountered.

An author's note provides additional information and resources.