Giants in the Land [Paperback]

Diana Appelbaum (Author), Michael McCurdy (Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 27, 2000 | Age Level: 8 and up | Grade Level: 4 and up

A story of the human ingenuity needed to turn the Giant Pines of New England into masts for the great British Navy.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The white pines of colonial New England were truly "giants living on this land," as first-time author Appelbaum imaginatively demonstrates. The trees, she notes, "stood taller than an apartment house twenty-five stories high, taller than the tallest building ever built in New Hampshire or Maine." Her story uses a wealth of such well-presented facts to describe how, in King George's day, these trees were laboriously cut, hoisted onto huge axles, hauled by teams of oxen to the nearest river and eventually transported to England, where they became the giant masts of British warships. These trees have all been felled, but as Appelbaum optimistically concludes, "giants are growing now." The scratchboard illustrations give this text real drama. McCurdy ( The Beasts of Bethlehem ) recreates the massiveness of his subject with heavily black trees that tower past the edges of the suitably tall (12-inch) pages or topple from one corner of a spread to another, dwarfing the men who harvest them. These powerful images make a potentially esoteric subject concrete and approachable. Ages 7-up.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Gr. 2-4. Much more than a simple ecology lesson, this picture book dramatizes both the power of nature and the drive of human technology. Giant white pine trees once grew in the New England woods for thousands of years; today there are none. In the eighteenth century, the British needed the trees for their great warships, ships that required masts 40 inches wide at the base, 120 feet tall, and absolutely straight. The facts are astonishing: Forests had to be cleared; roads had to be cut straight because a mast tree couldn't bend around a corner; special mast ships carried the great logs to England. The prose is restrained and lyrical, precise about the mechanism by which the trees were marked, cut down, and hauled to the sea, and romantic about the giants that lived on this land. McCurdy's dramatic black-and-white scratchboard drawings, many spread across two pages, capture the sweep and detail of the landscape, the anguish of the tree felling, and the huge, lumbering procession of the oxen straining at their chains to drag each heavy trunk to the sea. There's no hectoring about the environment, but the sense of grief is manifest; the trees are gone. And then the quiet surprise of the ending: "Step into the woods. . . . Giants are growing." Hazel Rochman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• Paperback: 32 pages
• Publisher: Sandpiper (March 27, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 061803305X
• ISBN-13: 978-0618033058
• Product Dimensions: 11.8 x 8.1 x 0.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #813,415 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Get this book!, November 20, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Giants in the Land (Hardcover)

An absolutely superb book about the 18th century process of selecting, felling and transporting enormous New England hardwood trees so that they might be fashioned into masts for the king's ships. This book is filled with wonderfully detailed drawings and fascinating information. An example: "A first-class British warship was larger than Faneuil Hall in Boston. It was larger than the State House at Williamsburg in Virginia, larger than any building in the colonies from Maine to Georgia." If only there were more books like this! A must for any classroom.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Giants in the Land, January 31, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Giants in the Land (Hardcover)

I really like this book because all of it is true and it happened where I live. I like to think that the giants once grew where my house is. It is also special that the giants only grew in New England. The story is good to listen to or to read because it is telling real things in a way that is fun to hear. I particularly like the part about having to put smaller trees and branches underneath to keep it from breaking when the giant falls. My Dad and I have cut down small trees it is exciting when they fall. Learning history through books like this is great.

5.0 out of 5 stars An outstanding history of the destruction of the mighty trees of the east coast of the United States, February 7, 2009

By 

Charles Ashbacher (Marion, Iowa United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Giants in the Land (Hardcover)

This book is about the past, specifically about the giant pine trees that grew up in what is now New England. Every schoolchild learns of the giant redwood trees on the west coast of the United States and how old they are. When the Europeans arrived on the east coast of the United States there were pine trees that were just as old and nearly as large as the mighty redwoods. However, that fact is rarely entered into the classroom discussions, as the large pine trees are all gone. The giant pine trees were the only ones that could serve as the main mast of the ships in the British Navy, so the largest were selected, cut and then transported to the sea. The minimum requirements were that the tree be at least forty inches in diameter at the base, one hundred and twenty feet high and completely straight.
This book is the story of those trees and their fate. The problems of cutting and transporting such large trees to the sea are described in detail. In many ways it is a sad tale, as it is an object lesson against unregulated cutting and for the scientific management of the environment. However, there is a positive side in that the more people learn about what was lost, the more they will want to preserve and protect what is left.