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Rural Route
Bookstore
An
online-only bookstore featuring books about Immigration and Pioneer Stories Song of Sampo Lake
by William Durbin![]() ![]() Moving from Flinland to Northern Minnesota in
1900, the Ojala Family, discover that starting a new life in America
was both a hardship and an opportunity. This story centers on
fifteen-year-old Matti who, along with adjusting to a new life in a new
land, strives to get out of his older brother's shadow and earn his
father's respect.
At first Matti worked alongside his
relatives in Minnesota's Soudan Mine, but an accident leads the
family to reconsider and pursue the dream of owning a
homestead. In the wilderness and on the edge of Sampo Lake, the
property shows promise, but also means hard work and more new
challenges. While he works hard at the homestead, Matti also teaches
English and is a store clerk. Balancing brutal winters, rocky
soil, language, and homesickness are pleasant cultural traditions,
strangers' concerns, land and labor's rewards, and the joy and
frustrations of a pet crow, a cat, and two mules.
Minnesota author William Durbin’s attention
to historical detail makes him one of today’s masters of historical
Young Adult fiction. See Winter
War. Age level 8 and up; Grade level 4 and up.
CH - 15 Paperback $11.95
Being
away from her father for five years has been hard for Britta, her
mother, and siblings. Britta’s father had gone ahead to America to make
money and send some back so the rest of the family could join him. On
the family's journey to England, in England, on the voyage to Ellis
Island, and subsequently during the adventure to the Midwest, not
everything goes as planned. All sorts of tribulations and delays occur,
and the family has good times and bad times, but Britta remains
hopeful. Throughout the journey and the book, she discovers inner
strength and resourcefulness she never knew she had. Elin's
Amerika by Marguerite de Angeli ![]() Unlike
other Children's and Young Adult books about Immigration, this one is
not about life on the prairies or in Chicago's ethnic ghettos of that
era. This is 99-page book is the only one I have seen that shares a
child's view of life in New Sweden, the first colony in the New World
where the earliest, most adventurous Scandinavian settlers lived.
This
experimental colony was founded in 1638 and located in the triangle
area along the Delaware River which today is bordered by Pennsylvania,
Delaware and New Jersey. Inhabitants were a mixture of Swedes, Finns,
Lenape, Minquas (Susquehannock), Dutch and British people. Twelve
expeditions of ships brought settlers and supplies from Sweden to this
colony between 1638 and 1655, when it was taken over by the Dutch and
nine years later by the British.
Originally
published in 1941, American Swedish groups received foundation dollars
and donations to reproduce this book in 2007 so that it could include
research that has come to light since Newbery Away-winning author de
Angeli wrote the first version.
This
nicely illustrated book, in both colored paintings and black and white
sketches, tells the story of Elin and her family and the adventures and
adversity they experience. Appropriate for ages 8 to 12, the story
focuses on Elin, who has been thrust into this foreign place and, like
children all over the world in all eras, longs most for a playmate from
back home.
CH - 34 Paperback $15.99
History and fiction are combined in this exciting account of the catastrophic Cloquet Fire. Fourteen-year-old Lisa Hanson falls asleep in present day Cloquet and is mysteriously transported to Cloquet on the day of the fire. Everyone there thinks she is Liisa Maki, her grandma's oldest sister who disappeared that day and was never heard of again. By the end of her eye-opening journey into the past, Lisa solves the mystery of her missing great aunt. FN
- 02 Paperback $9.95 Now $7.95 CH - 3 Paperback $6.00 Now $4.95
CH - 1 Paperback $5.99
Children
who are interested in learning words in Norwegian or Swedish
should check out the illustrated dictionaries here.
Order by using the 'Place an Order' form or you may order by phone (800 494-9124). For payment and shipping charges, see 'Place an Order.' |