GRANDPA HAD A WINDMILL, GRANDMA HAD A CHURN

by Louise A. Jackson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 1977

The author's first-person memories of rural Texas in the 1940s (it looks earlier), with a photo-illustrated paragraph/double-page recalling each object or device possessed by her grandparents. Grandpa's whetstone, corn crib, and chopping block alternate with Grandma's thimble, quilting frame, and food storage cellar. (""I didn't go down the steps by myself. I just went down with Grandma."") But their life wasn't all work: Grandpa also had goldfish and Grandma her guineas, which she kept ""just because I like to have them around the place. That's reason enough."" And at the end there is Grandpa's fiddle which he plays at night while Grandma plays her piano. The little girl is with them there and in other pictures, and Jackson works in references to her own experience with every object described--a device that she never allows to become mechanical. Similarly, her descriptions of her grandparents at their work unobtrusively explains how each object functions, without resorting to direct exposition. With Ancoma's expert photos--at the same time sharp for clarity and soft for memory--it's a surprisingly well-executed and unsentimental contribution to the nostalgia shelf.

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1977

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Parents' Magazine Press

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1977

Categories: CHILDREN'S