From School Library Journal
Kindergarten-Grade 2-A fictionalized story of a historical event. During the War of 1812, the American army commissioned a local widow, flag maker Mary Pickersgill, to create an extravagantly large flag to be flown over Fort McHenry near Baltimore's harbor; the flag still exists and now rests at the Smithsonian. By relating events from the point of view of 12-year-old Caroline Pickersgill, the action becomes more immediate to youngsters. According to letters of the time, quoted in the end material, the woman was helped by her daughter and perhaps others (though the assistance of Caroline's grandmother, cousins, and a servant and slave is undocumented). The flag, which took six weeks to complete, was 30 feet by 42, weighed 80 pounds, had stripes 2 feet wide, and stars measuring 2 feet from point to point. Whether it flew over the fort during the bombardment that inspired Francis Scott Key to write "The Star Spangled Banner" is a matter of debate among scholars; the author's note suggests that, in fact, a smaller, less expensive storm flag may have been used. This slender story seems oddly incomplete in this telling; it is unclear if the British even continued their invasion. Capable if wispy illustrations in a folk-art vein (although, surely, young girls wore stockings with their shoes in those days) offer panoramas of the harbor and Baltimore. This book should be complemented by more academic materials in a school setting.
-Dona Ratterree, New York City Public Schools Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Gr. 1-4. In this accomplished work of picture-book nonfiction, Bartoletti explores a hallowed event in U.S. history: the British attack of Fort McHenry in 1813 and the celebrated resilience of its garrison flag. She finds a fresh way into this oft-told story by focusing on 13-year-old Caroline Pickersgill, who assisted her mother in the creation of the fort's immense American flag, the very one that hangs in the Smithsonian today. Caroline is older than most picture-book protagonists, but the real draw here isn't the girl: it's the 30-by-42-foot flag she helps sew, so big that it "spilled over their laps and lay in folds on the floor" and had to be moved to a warehouse for completion. Once the flag is finished, Bartoletti writes feelingly of the talismanic comfort it provides when Caroline glimpses it from afar during the British attack. The book's resonance owes as much to the delicate watercolors as to Bartoletti's controlled storytelling; Nivola's tidy, tranquil interiors serve as a ringing counterpoint to the chaos in the background. Bibliographic sources and "Flag Facts," including an acknowledgment that "some historians question whether the garrison flag or a smaller storm flag" flew during the battle, demonstrate the attention to detail that earned Bartoletti the 2002 Sibert Medal for
Black Potatoes. Jennifer Mattson
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