Cindy Trumbore and Susan L. Roth (Author,Illustrator). The Mangrove Tree: Planting Trees to Feed Families;Calvin Alexander Ramsey,Bettye Stroud and John Holyfield (illustrator). Belle,the Last Mule at Gee’s Bend: A Civil Rights Story

Everybody is somebody

We are going to tell you about two books, Belle, the Last Mule of Gee’s Bend, by Calvin Alexander Ramsey and Bettye Stroud with watercolor illustrations from the brushes of John Holyfield (published by Candlewick Press, Somerville MA, 2011) and The Mangrove Tree: Planting Trees to Feed Families, by Susan L. Roth and Cindy Trumbore, illustrated with collages also by Susan L. Roth, (published by Lee & Low Books, NY, 2011). These books were written for children and we believe those in the 1st and 2nd grades are the best audience. Since we are only familiar with these grades from our own experiences, we are only guessing on the reading grade-levels. As books written for children, we write our review for children, too. In fact, we will speak to them directly. We know this is a professional social work journal, but the audience of our review is the same readership of these books, young readers. We are somewhat certain that adults will also understand our review.

Let us first consider each book by itself and then we will compare them. Belle is a beautifully told story about Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement, and that was during the time of your older parents’ and your grandparents’ life. It was in the 1950s and early 1960s and needs to continue today. The story is of an African American youngster named Alex who is waiting for his mother, and while waiting he watches a mule eating a neighbor’s garden. Miz Pettyway sits down with him and tells him the story of how Martin Luther King thought the struggles for equality by African Americans was best seen in the strength of the mule, and how Belle earned a right to those collard greens in the neighbor’s garden. We do not want to give away the story, so we will only say that this is how our story begins and in the end Alex understands history and the struggles for being treated just like everybody else. Nothing more, being treated just like everybody else. Being treated fairly.

Within this story, the book has illustrations that are cool. There are a total of 15 delightful watercolors. The book ends with an author’s note on the history of Belle and a nice picture of the funeral of Dr Martin Luther King on 9 April 1968 with Belle as one of the mules pulling the funeral wagon. We think this book is a good read for a second grader. It says to the second grader that everybody is somebody important and can contribute in the struggles of others to overcome social injustices. We like this book and we recommend it to second graders and advanced first graders.

Everybody is somebody important is also the story in The Mangrove Tree: Planting Trees to Feed Families. It is the true story of Dr Gordon Sato, who as a child was sent to a concentration camp for Japanese Americans during World War II, which was from 1941 to 1945. The internment camp was named ‘Manzanar War Relocation Center’ and it was in the desert. With a poetic rhyme and increasing beat, the book tells the story of how Dr Sato helps the small east African nation of Eritrea, master their future by planting mangrove trees in order to become sustainable. What we mean by sustainability is creating an environment in which we take care of it and it takes care of us. In this story we learn about the mangrove tree, and people using the mangrove tree to provide food for goats, which then provide milk and food for parents and children. It is also about making a sustainable environment to provide food for animals and people and even fish in the waters which in turn contribute to the cycle of life of a sustainable environment; or shall we say, a healthy planet. The book shows how a simple little tree, if working together with people, can help people and animals live a better life. The book tells this story with beautiful collage illustrations and reflecting east African culture, something most young readers would not be able to image before reading The Mangrove Tree. It also teaches you about another country and culture, which is important and cool.

These two books have a lot in common. Both are about strong people who remembered where they came from before they were adults. Now that is an important lesson to learn at any grade level. The books also show how civil rights and sustainability overlap as both were advanced by those who were deprived of civil rights. They were not treated like everybody else. It was unfair. One is of a civil rights story of the past that needs to be continued today and the other of a story of today that will define the future of the young people’s tomorrow.

Both are of stories that must live on. Let us consider just two examples, fair pay of men and women and creating a sustainable environment. We will then consider a few things that young people can do about these issues.

Equal pay for boys and girls is important because more women are raising their children on their own and seem to have an unfair disadvantage compared to boys. This is like saying boys and girls have to race to the river, but we will give boys a head start. And good luck girls! In fact, in the USA it would be like boys getting a $1.00 a week allowance while girls get .77 cents. Or consider it this way, boys get recess for 30 minutes, but girls only get 23 minutes of recess. That would not seem fair to most young students. Does it seem fair to you? And it may be even more unfair. Hispanic girls get only 61 cents when white boys get $1.00 and African American girls only get 70 cents. Using recess to understand how this is not fair, African American girls only get 21 minutes of recess and Hispanic girls only get 18 minutes of recess while the boys still get 30 minutes.

This unfairness is not just in the United States. Some parts of the world are a little better and some a lot worse. In the European Union girls would earn about 83 cents while the boys get a dollar. In some places like Estonia girls will only get 75 cents when boys get a dollar. In some Middle East countries, e.g. Bahrain, girls would only get 60 cents and boys would get a $1.00. As far as the civil rights issues of equal pay for women and men, the worldwide range is that girls get 13 cents to 33 cents less than boys. Like the treatment of African Americans that was told in Belle, the civil rights struggle for equality needs to continue today. It will be up to young people to do this.

A sustainable environment is the basic story of The Mangrove Tree as it shows how helping the environment helps people and other animals. It is about creating and giving to the environment and taking from the environment in a way as not to hurt it. This is likely the calling card of the young generation. Youth are deciding which college to enroll in based on the college’s sustainability plan. Young people are the forward marching band in recycling and composting, which to one of the authors is like storing a bucket of garbage under your sink and to the other author a way to create soil for big worms. The simple mangrove tree shows youngsters how hunger and global warming are intertwined and helping one helps the other. Both books show how helping others, whether great men, a mule or a mangrove tree, is a good thing.

So what’s a kid to do?, we hope you ask. There are lots you, your schoolmates and your friends can do, and we will give you just a few suggestions. The most important one is to practice getting involved in solving problems, and then dream of new solutions to these and other problems. Dream of solutions by yourself or together with your friends as a team, but always dream.

Another suggestion is to celebrate ‘Equal Pay Day’ in your schools and other official gatherings, like campfire girls/cub scouts or girl scouts/boy scouts, or through Big Brothers/Big Sister Programs or boys clubs and girls clubs. Equal Pay Day is 16 April.

Try playing a game of ‘Monopoly’ but be unfair. Give the girls the total amount of ‘monopoly money’ and give the boys $70 dollar for every $100 girls are given. Play the game. Good luck boys! After you are tired of the game (as not many people ever finish an entire game), stop and talk about how girls have advantage over boys and the boys were treated unfairly. How does that feel? Now ask what can be done?

Plant a few small trees in your classroom early in fall, and then care for them until spring. Plant them outdoors at your school or a nearby park. You will be in school for a few years and you will see how your own ‘mangrove tree’ helps others. Plus, when you are older you will always be able to see your tree’s contribution to the environment. Like Dr Sato, by planting a little tree now, you too are somebody important.

Since the world is so small after all, share your successes with other students from a different country than the one you live in. With your class or friends, find a country you like and then read about it either at the library or on the internet. Read about one of the problems young people have and think of ways to solve that problem. When you are done, dream of two more ways to solve that problem. Like Dr King and Dr Sato, and the mule, Belle, you have the strength. Try to see if one of these solutions can be put into action with the help of your teacher or adult handler.

Have an organized fund-raiser to collect money for Dr Sato’s organization that is planting mangrove trees in other areas of the world. Follow his development at his webpage (http://themanzanaproject.com), and watch how over the course of the school year the mangrove trees take root and take off. The address for donations is in the back of the book.

Recycle more trash, refuse plastic bags, and reuse. If you cannot reuse it, give it to someone who can.

Composite your family’s kitchen scraps and give the results to a community garden. Start a community garden or participate in one. It is fun to grow things and then you get to eat these things, too. Plus, this will save your family money. It will also teach you patience.

In conclusion, we want to point out that Dr Sato has named his work ‘The Manzanar Project’ after the concentration camp where he learned to grow corn in the desert to help feed his family. He named it this to remind people, youngsters and adults alike, that we can fight and beat injustices with hope (and strength of a mule) if we never give up. Hope and never giving up is also the story of Dr Martin Luther King. Both stories are of people who fought injustice with hope. So, too, it must be the story of young people. Both stories show how serving others is a good thing, and that is something for young and older readers alike. Maybe in the end, children’s books are not just for kids.