Along the Way - Mary's dream and the Gingerbread Cooky (sp?).

The Phil Are GO! Garage Sale Assault Force has unearthed another gem of a children's reader. Along the Way was originally published in 1940, but this seems to be the second printing, from 1947. The cover is that fabricky stuff, printed in vivid black-on-very-blackey-blue. We've pumped the levels so you can make out the cover art of a girl practicing her baby shake.

Our copy was owned by 4th grader Rosemary Polito during her stint in the Mitchell Elementary School, which looks like this:



So what was Rosemary into? Making up names for all the kids in the illustrations. We see this on several of the ancient schoolbooks in our collection, all apparently owned by Rosemary The Namer. She's probably around eighty years old now. That's a lot of naming.

Today's story is one of horror. It's about a cooky (This is not the first time we've exposed The Past's weird habit of spelling that word wrong.) trying desperately to escape the ravening jaws of a little girl. No shit. Read for yourself. This children's story may be too intense for children. If you're a children, stop it. If you have children, send them out into the yard for a few minutes. As long as they're out there, have them clean that dead possum out of the gutters. If you don't have children, but maybe some day if you find the right man, woman, or manwoman, just have your gametes turn their heads for a couple of few.

Here are the lessons we learn from today's story..

•  Chasing someone amounts to little more than leaning forward slightly and waving your arms around a little (p32).
• Children of The Forties rarely saw more than ten cookies at once (p28).
•  When threatened with a messy death, offer a deal to betray many more of your kind, in order to save yourself (p33).
•  Offer to murder anyone that looks sad (p33).
•  Unless you kill and eat everyone you see, you will lose them (p36).

I hope Rose Polito made it out of the 4th grade okay.