James Madison Book Award Winner, 2004

An American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793
Author: Jim Murphy
Publisher: Clarion Books

This thoroughly-researched, well-written book tells the story of a calamitous epidemic in late-eighteenth century Philadelphia and of the heroes who stepped forward during the crisis. One of those was Matthew Clarkson, the mayor of Philadelphia, who stayed in the city when most high officials were fleeing. Others were the members of the Free African Society, led by Absalom Jones and Richard Allen, who believed it their duty, in the words of Jones and Allen, “to do all the good we could to our fellow mortals.” When no one else was willing to nurse the sick, members of the Free African Society cared for them. When they came upon orphaned children wandering in the streets, they found them shelter, and when the dead had to be buried, they took them to the graveyard.

Interwoven with the human story of the epidemic is a medical history of yellow fever that begins with the fierce dispute among doctors in Philadelphia about how best to treat those who fell ill. Benjamin Rush, perhaps the most eminent physician in young America, employed bleeding and purging, an approach that others, who turned out to be right, thought harmful. Merchant Stephen Girard, barrel maker Peter Helm, and Dr. Jean Devéze organized a hospital at an abandoned house called Bush Hill and provided patients fresh water and clean sickrooms. A large part of the uncertainty surrounding the disease was that no one knew what caused it. Not until the twentieth century, and the death of a brave researcher named Jesse Lazear, did people begin to understand that yellow fever was spread by a tiny insect, the female Aedes aegypti mosquito.

Filled with a wealth of information, An American Plague is a fascinating story that will make clear to middle-schoolers how compelling historical study can be.

Press Release:    Lynne Cheney Announces 2004 Book Award Winner

James Madison Honor Books, 2004

Ben Franklin’s Almanac: Being a True Account of the Good Gentleman’s Life
Author: Candace Fleming
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Put together as a collage of 18th century cartoons, engravings, portraits and narrative perspectives on Ben Franklin, Ben Franklin’s Almanac evokes the design of Franklin’s own Poor Richard’s Almanack, all the while showing the breadth of this founder’s accomplishments. Without attempting to be comprehensive, the book provides tantalizing insights into Franklin’s character. Inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, writer, he started each day with the question, “What good will I do today?” In separate days’ work, he attempted to persuade the British to adopt forbearance toward America, added words to the Declaration of Independence, charted the course of the Gulf Stream, and invented lightning rods. This delightful, accessible book will be picked up again and again by readers nine to twelve and older.

Duel of the Ironclads: The Monitor vs. the Virginia
Author and Illustrator: Patrick O’Brien
Publisher: Walker & Company

Duel of the Ironclads depicts the advent of modern naval warfare in a hard-fought battle between two technological wonders of the Civil War: the ships the Monitor and the Virginia. When the Union’s Portsmouth, Virginia shipyard fell into southern hands, confederates began to build the ironclad Virginia on the foundation of a Union ship, the Merrimack. The Union responded by building the Monitor in just 100 days. The two ships met in the waters of Hampton Roads, and although the four-hour battle they fought ended in a draw, their encounter was momentous. From the firepower each sustained, it was clear to everyone that wooden ships were no longer effective instruments of war. Iron warships were the way of the future. The watercolor and gouache illustrations of the ships in this picture book are accurate and detailed. The depictions of battle burst with energy, bringing to elementary school students a stirring piece of American naval history.

Mack Made Movies
Author and Illustrator: Don Brown
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press

At once humorous and informative, Mack Made Movies tells the story of the beginnings of the motion picture business. Mack Sennett, believing that audiences would love slapstick in movies as much as they loved it in vaudeville, brought together cameramen, set designers, makeup artists, writers, and comic actors (including Charlie Chaplin) to build Keystone Pictures. Sennett’s success was his genius for timing, and this picture book reflects the quick-paced, pie-in-the-face, zany sequences that mark his silent film classics. This attractive picture book, with its appealing, earth-tone illustrations, is a lighthearted introduction for elementary students to the way that movies began.

Shutting Out the Sky: Life in the Tenements of New York 1880–1924
Author: Deborah Hopkinson
Publisher: Scholastic, Inc.

Shutting out the Sky follows the experiences of five young immigrants who left small towns in eastern and southern Europe to live in tenements in Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Their voices combine with other first-hand accounts of the experiences of some of the 17 million people who arrived in New York between 1880 and 1919. In their own words, we hear immigrants describe how they lived and worked, learned and played. This book for middle-school students shows that while life was often grim for people who lived in crowded neighborhoods where tenements shut out the sky, their adopted life, and free schooling in particular, opened possibilities and forwarded their dreams of the future.

Read about the 2003 James Madison Book Award Winner