Tag Archives: Native American

Woods Runner

Probably the best known author for young readers, particularly males, has to be GARY PAULSEN. His outdoor adventure stories have been responsible for turning more young males on to reading than perhaps any other contemporary author. This story centers on 13 year old Samuel and takes place in the British Colony of Pennsylvania. Samuel and his parents live on the frontier. They are probably “well educated” by frontier standards meaning they can read and write. Samuel is off hunting bear when he notices smoke coming for the general area of where his family and other settlers live. By the time he races home, he finds most of the cabins burned and many of the inhabitants slaughtered. His family was not among the corpses. He buries the dead and then determined to rescue his parents, he begins tracking the survivors.

The Great Death

If you are ever interested in a study of Alaska, at any level beyond say Grade 6, than may I recommend an amazing book, THE GREAT DEATH by John Smegler ( Henry Holt, 2009, $16.99). This book of only 166 pages follows two young Alaskan native girls at the beginning of the twentieth century who are fleeing a pandemic of measles, smallpox and influenza. Some light-colored strangers with red spots on their bodies came to their village. Very quickly disease and death spread everywhere.