Book Smarts
For the young pupil who daydreamed of exotic places and heroic deeds early in this century, a schoolbook could quench the imagination. Back then, history textbooks were plump with lively narratives about the glorious conquests of brave explorers and the noble struggles of the nation's founders to create a new republic.
One 1910 text likened Christopher Columbus' discovery of America to a providential mission. "Columbus believed that God had chosen him to go out as a missionary to these far-off lands. He kept that belief to the end. It gave a certain dignity to his work and made his life noble in many ways," began one story in Leading Facts of American History, published by Ginn & Co.
Other history books and school readers were filled with similar tales. They, too, led children on exciting expeditions through uncharted territory and to chance meetings with Indians in the vast wilderness. They exposed them to the great orations of Roman statesmen, the wonders of scientific discoveries and modern inventions, and the patriotic fervor that bound great men together to form a government of, by,...
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