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[JoseSPiano]

As for books...

The two literary books I distinctly remember sitting on my parents' bookshelf were "Love Story" and an edition of "Don Quixote".  I remember them for their covers.  "Love Story" had a sort of pale green cover, with the title in a "Mistral" type of font, and "Don Quixote" looked to be from one of those special Home Library editions - nice leather, gold leafing, etc.  I finally read "Love Story" when I was in high school, but I never got around to reading "Don Quixote".  But I still have both books in my library now.

The other books I remember were some cookbooks - a candy one; a big, red, New York Times cookbook - big print too, etc.

And my parents had one songbook: "Something To Sing About" - a neat collection of songs and stories about the songs and singers, mainly folk artists.  My first exposure to "Peter, Paul & Mary" was through that book.

OH!  And quite a collection of Reader's Digest Condensed Books.  I never really read those either, but they always looked good on the shelves.

[bk]

JMK: Sorry I didn't get around to getting you the song - it's just too crazy around here right now.

[bk]

It seems we have less and less posts at this time each day that passes.  It must be because it's June, June, June, because the exact same thing happened last year and the year before.  Let's not be predictable!

[JoseSPiano]

As for childrens' books...

There was one of those Big collection of Mother Goose Stories and Rhymes.  I actually came across a copy in a used bookstore not too long ago... I guess I should have taken better care of my "original", since the one I saw was listing at $200.  In any case...

One of my favorite things in elementary school was the Scholastic Book Club.  We'd get that mini-newspaper flyer every few weeks. I'd check off the books that I wanted.  Then beg my parents for the money.  Then wait.. and wait... And then...!!!  Sometimes I even helped check the books in when the box got delivered to the classroom.

"Alvin's Secret Code"; "Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing" and it's sequels; the "Ramona" books; "The Hardy Boys" series; "The Summer of the Swans"; "The Bridge to Terabithia"; "The Great Gilly Hopkins"; Madeleine L'Engle's "A Wrinkle In Time" series...

"James and the Giant Peach" - How I miss the original edition with the pencil line drawings.  The "new" edition with the movie-inspired drawings... Yuck!  -And since the movie changed the ending anyway... Yuck!

"A Cricket In Times Square" - This was read to us almost yearly from 2nd to 5th grade.

Lots of books.  And I'm sure that I actually did read them at the time, not just collect them.

Oh, and since I did go to a Catholic elementary school, "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe" was more or less required reading.  I remember being introduced to "The Chronicles of Narnia" in 6th Grade, but "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe" was actually on my high school's freshman summer reading list.

[JoseSPiano]

DR elmoore - I had and still have a couple of those Signet collections.  There's one with Great American Plays (?) which has "The Glass Menagerie" in it.  However, it also has "Winterset" too  - which I've never been able to get through.  The blank verse still throws me.  I need to read it out loud for it to make sense.

And, I, too, cherish my copy of "Three Plays By Thornton Wilder".  I have two editions of it.  Some small paperback-size edition, as well as some "anniversary" copy - oversize paperback.  The Skin of Our Teeth is one of my favorite plays of all time.  -And I became even more hooked on it after the PBS broadcast of the Old Globe production with Blair Brown, Sada Thompson, et al.

When I was in my junior year in high school, I started noticing that there were some minor textual changes from edition to edition of "The Skin of Our Teeth" - mainly in the whole "Adam! Cain!" fight.  I ended up doing my AP English project on the play.  However, due to my lack of access to certain research materials, I never really was able to find out the reasons for the changes, just that they existed.

And as much as people may want to turn it into a musical... I really think it should stay a play.  The addition of songs would just mean that some of the original text/material would have to be cut out in order to bring the whole evening into an "acceptable" running time.  I missed the Signature production of Kander & Ebb's version - and, from all accounts, that was a good thing.

[Rodzinski]

Scholastic Books were the greatest. Order x amount of books, get a free poster of a kitten. There was nothing as fun as the day when your books arrived. "Bridge to Terabithia", that was classic, like, who knew a kid could die in a kids book?

I have an old series of old books about a family called THE HAPPY HOLLISTERS. Anyone familiar with those?

[JoseSPiano]

"Rikki Tikki Tembo No Sarembo Chari Bari Ruchi Pip Peri Pembo"

(sp?)

[Rodzinski]

I had a Funk & Wagnall's encyclopedia set fro 1974 in my bedroom. I read them rarely, but can still remember a lot of the guide words from the sides of the books:

A-AMERI
FINNI-GANGR
HORTI-ISOTO
RUSSI-SOMAL
TELEP- UNITE
UNITE-WATER

and so forth...

[Rodzinski]

"Rikki Tikki Tembo No Sarembo Chari Bari Ruchi Pip Peri Pembo"

(sp?)

Or as me and my pals would say, "Chari Bari Buchi, Father Sarducci."

[JoseSPiano]

Scholastic Books were the greatest. Order x amount of books, get a free poster of a kitten. There was nothing as fun as the day when your books arrived. "Bridge to Terabithia", that was classic, like, who knew a kid could die in a kids book?

I have an old series of old books about a family called THE HAPPY HOLLISTERS. Anyone familiar with those?

As for Scholastic Books - read above!



-And I had forgotten about the premiums if you ordered a certain book or a certain number of books.

OH!  And those Book Fairs that would go from school auditorium to school auditorium.  I would spend hours browsing and scouting.  All types of books for children and adults.  I think I even bought some origami books at one in fourth grade.

Yeah, "Bridge To Terabithia"... Who knew?  When it came to that passage in the book, I remember having to read it over a few times... It truly caught me off guard.  I just had to make sure that what had happened, happened.  Very moving.  Hmm... I wonder if Katharine Patterson is still writing.

"The Happy Hollisters" was that that series about the family who was sort of 'weird' - interesting physical traits, abilities.  -Something ringing a bell.

[JoseSPiano]

I had a Funk & Wagnall's encyclopedia set fro 1974 in my bedroom. I read them rarely, but can still remember a lot of the guide words from the sides of the books:

A-AMERI
FINNI-GANGR
HORTI-ISOTO
RUSSI-SOMAL
TELEP- UNITE
UNITE-WATER

and so forth...

LOL!!! -Literally!

[bk]

I've already been going like crazy.  It seems certain papers that were supposed to be Fed Exed back to me didn't get here, so I'm having to scurry and type up song lists, and cast lists, and credit pages for ATB.  

[JoseSPiano]

Oh, and how could I forget..

"Old Yeller"
"Sounder"

There's still that one passage in "Sounder" that sticks in my mind... Where the young boy is looking at the bit of wood from his carving/whittling that are sitting underneath their stove/fire...  How the curved pieces would straighten out, and how the straight pieces would curve when they would start to burn up.

-At least I think that was in "Sounder".

Oh, and "Tuck Everlasting", and "The Boxcar Children".

[Rodzinski]

You couldn't get less weird than the Happy Hollisters. Unless total, ceaseless happiness weirds you out.  They were a happy bunch.

[JoseSPiano]

I need some breakfast/brunch/lunch...

Laters...

[JoseSPiano]

You couldn't get less weird than the Happy Hollisters. Unless total, ceaseless happiness weirds you out.  They were a happy bunch.

Thanks for the visual aid, DR Rodzinksi.  I do remember them now.

[Rodzinski]

Scholastic Book Fairs, that's another story. I wanted the Farrah Fawcett cheapie bio, so I asked my mom for a couple dollars. She, for some reason, demanded to know what book I wanted, and I just turned beet red and ran out rather than admit my crush on Farrah.

[vixmom]

I read Bridge to Terabitha for the first time last year when the Vixter brought it home from school

what a sad book!

[elmore3003]

And, I, too, cherish my copy of "Three Plays By Thornton Wilder".  I have two editions of it.  Some small paperback-size edition, as well as some "anniversary" copy - oversize paperback.  The Skin of Our Teeth is one of my favorite plays of all time.  -And I became even more hooked on it after the PBS broadcast of the Old Globe production with Blair Brown, Sada Thompson, et al.

And as much as people may want to turn it into a musical... I really think it should stay a play.  The addition of songs would just mean that some of the original text/material would have to be cut out in order to bring the whole evening into an "acceptable" running time.  I missed the Signature production of Kander & Ebb's version - and, from all accounts, that was a good thing.

DRJose, SKIN OF OUR TEETH is one of my most favorite plays as well, and I agree with you about a musical version.  I think the play's textual jokes and switches in time and space, require a composer of vast knowledge, wit, and compositional skills.  Leonard Bernstein is the only composer I think capable of pulling it off and he gave up on it.  Perhaps it was because he'd already written his great comic opera with CANDIDE and couldn't go back?   With THE MATCHMAKER, however, I think HELLO DOLLY's an improvement.

[Jennifer]

I also remember getting those pamphlets in elementary school to buy books. I loved those!  You'd get a couple of weeks to look through the brochure and then bring in your order. And then wait for the books!  That was fun.

[Ron Pulliam]

My mother subscribed to a book club for me, as a Christmas present, when I was in second grade.  Book titles I remember are "Slim Green" and "A Boy Named Boo."

I remember reading "The Bobbsey Twins" in various adventures, and my parents bought the Encyclopedia Americana which came with The Book of Knowledge.  The Book of Knowledge was a feast for me...each book was filled with information, including full stories, and poems.  I spent hours and hours poring over those books.  I wish I had them now, but they were long ago given away by my folks who got tired of lugging them from address to address as they moved around.

[Ron Pulliam]

DR Elmoore3003:  I remember a Scrooge McDuck tale about a golden fleece, too.  No particulars...just an image.

[Ben]

a couple of photos to jog memories

[Ben]

Presenting The Hollisters

[MBarnum]

My other favorite book was MISS SUZY. I can remember making a cardboard verison of Miss Suzy's tree house.

[MBarnum]

And THE OLD BLACK WITCH!
I loved this book!

[MBarnum]

And finally, THE BLAH.

Another favorite. I have copies of all my other favorite books, but not this one.

[DearReaderLaura]

Here he comes!

[Ginny]

It seems we have less and less posts at this time each day that passes.  It must be because it's June, June, June, because the exact same thing happened last year and the year before.  Let's not be predictable!

Sorry, bk, I tried to post earlier this morning and learned what people mean when they say, "I just lost a long post!"  Then I had to go spend 3 hours answering questions from the great unwashed.  So, I'm back now, having my lunch and will try again.

[Stuart]

As for the TOD....hmmmmmm, let me think a second.  Definitely a set of World Book encyclopedia (I am assuming that from the "ia" ending on encyclopedia it is plural for something.  Would a single one be an encyclopedium?).  They were c.1965 but Mom would faithfully buy the annual addendum each year until I graduated from HS.

I also remember, on their/her bookshelves various Judaica books.  And some not so Judaic, in a sense, such as "Loxfinger," which I never read, but always assumed was about the Jewish James Bond.  Also Alan King's "Help! I'm a Prisoner in a Chinese Fortune Cookie Factory."  Also, loads of paperbacks, sometimes retreived from the incinerator room.

There was always a newspaper of some sort.  In my younger days, definitely the NY Post, when it was still a liberal Jewish paper, not the scandal sheet it is today.  The Sunday Times and Sunday Daily News.  Magazines, too:  New York, Time (and/or Newsweek), Life, when it was still a weekly.  I think Look, too, while it was still around.

And, yes, Readers' Digest condensed books.  One of which I think contained "The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant."

As far as my own books were concerned, I was fond of Beverly Cleary's "Ribsy," Encyclopedia Brown.  We had a terrific set of children's books in very bright cloth-covered hardback editions.  Couldn't tell you what the titles were, as I never cracked one open, as I recall.  But there they stood, paint job after paint job.  Red, Blue, Yellow, Green.  Maybe other colors.

As memory serves, the Flatlands branch of the Brooklyn Public Library (which was actually on Flatbush Avenue, not Flatlands Avenue) was where I first discovered Theatre Worlds.  It was also from where I borrowed "Auntie Mame," at probably a too-young age to appreciate it.