American hero stories

Preface

IF I were teaching the history of the United States to boys and girls of nine or ten, T would do it by having them read simple, picturesque stories of the men who have made our country what it is. Then I would let the children talk of what they had read and ask questions about it. Some of these questions I would answer; some I would ask them to try to answer for themselves. I would say nothing about exact dates, but I would make four or rive general divisions of our history, such as discoveries and settlements, Colonial days and Indian wars, the Revolution, and so on. I would go through the stories rapidly in their chronological order, bringing out any information that the children might have gathered and occasionally adding a word to connect the stories or to make some point clear.

What would this accomplish? At the end of the reading the children would be on good terms with twenty- five or more of the chief actors in the story of the United States; they would be well prepared for a "real history," and, best of all, they would look forward to it, not with dread, but with pleasant anticipation.

This book is written from this viewpoint. It contains five accounts of voyages and explorers, ranging from Columbus to Lewis and Clark ; stories of five colonies of marked dissimilarity — Virginia, Quebec, Plymouth, New York, and Philadelphia ; brief lives of four pioneers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; fifteen short stories of war time ; and a sketch of Roosevelt's career. In treating of our wars, it seemed wisest not to attempt any formal explanation of causes and results, but rather to picture a number iv PREFACE

of separate and interesting achievements, choosing as far as possible actions that have distinct heroes. The chapters are arranged in chronological order, with a threac 1 of continuity running through them. The aim of the book is to introduce in informal and friendly fashion some of the makers of American history, and to provide a simple, broad foundation for future study of history and biography.

Acknowledgments are due to the courtesy of the following for permission to use their material for illustrations: to The Title Guarantee and Trust Co. of New York for New Amsterdam in Stuyvesmif s Time ; to Mr. C. M. Barton, President of the Historical Society of Michigan, for Gladwyrfs Warning from the Indian Girl ; to Mr. Charles E. Goodspeed for Washington at the Delaware ; to McClure's Magazine for portrait of Daniel Boone; to the New England Magazine for The Indian Woman who Guided Lewis and Clark and the Seal of the Lewis and Clark Exposition ; to The Outing Magazine for The Marriage and The March of David Crockett. The illustrations in the chapter on Roosevelt are from photographs copyrighted by Underwood and Underwood, and by W. S. Ritch.

Eva March Tappan.

Worcester, Massachusetts, March 18, 1920.