The Associated Press reports that “Roughly 3 in 4 Americans believe the upcoming presidential election is vital to the future of U.S. democracy” (Swenson & Sanders, 2024, para. 1). Whichever candidate wins in November will carry the immense responsibility of governing a nation divided by partisanship. However, several presidents faced grave circumstances during their terms of office, most notably Abraham Lincoln, who governed during our country’s Civil War.
A recent survey of presidential scholars conducted between November 15 and December 31, 2023, finds Abraham Lincoln remains America’s greatest president (Rottinghaus & Vaughn, 2024). For the author-illustrator pair Ingri and Edgar Parin d’Aulaire, “Lincoln was America’s shining symbol of democracy, fairness, and tolerance, … standing against tyranny, prejudice, and injustice” (Berg, 2008, Publisher’s Note). Their 1940 Caldecott Medal winner Abraham Lincoln has never gone out of print. The d’Aulaires traveled throughout Kentucky and Illinois, drawing in their notebooks to capture authentic details of Lincoln’s world from his birth to the presidency (Gross, 2015). Working as a team on both art and text, they were once described as “one unity with two heads, four hands, and one handwriting” (Hoke, 2002, p. 119).
The illustrations for their book were created with “lithographic pencil on stone” (ALSC, 2020, p. 166). This process involved “etching the drawing five times on individual stone slabs (weighing from 50 – 100 pounds) and printing these perfectly matched stones in five colors.” This was labor intensive work, but the d’Aulaires chose the “ … process of stone lithography to create books they believed offered the child reader the beauty and color intensity of hand drawings” (Berg, 2008, Publisher’s Note). Rea Berg, editor and founder of Beautiful Feet Books, said, “They were considered the first illustrators to actually make children’s books an art form” (Gross, 2015, para. 3).
After a time, printers were unwilling to continue working with the heavy stone slabs required for lithography. They switched to acetate film, which some felt lacked the “quality, clarity, and color” of the original art (Berg, 2008, Publisher’s Note). So, in 1957, the d’Aulaires began redrawing the illustrations for all their books, including Abraham Lincoln. Readers may not be able to distinguish differences in “quality, clarity, and color” in the new edition, but there are some slight differences in the illustrations, and also in the page layouts and text. The original 1939 edition included cultural stereotypes from that time period, and they were not all erased in the 1957 edition.
In 2008, to honor the d’Aulaire’s art, Beautiful Feet Books publishers scanned reproductions of the original art for Abraham Lincoln acquired by Yale University. They wanted to recreate a book as close as possible to the original. In 2015, Beautiful Feet Books published a 75th Anniversary edition, and with permission from the D’Aulaire estate, they made “minor modifications to the original art and text to reflect contemporary views of race politics and to reflect historical accuracy” (Gross, 2015, para. 9). One example is Lincoln walking down the street with enslaved people bowing to him. Gross quotes publisher Berg, “The original didn’t say that he actually shook hands with them. So we altered his face and made him shake hands with the former slaves and added in what he actually said in the historical record, which was, ‘Do not kneel to me.’”
Lincoln is often referred to as “Honest Abe.” In the 2001 Caldecott Medal book So You Want to Be President?, Judith St. George advises, “One thing is certain, if you want to be President — and stay President — be honest.” She humorously compares and contrasts presidents from George Washington to Bill Clinton with David Small’s droll political cartoon style illustrations in “water color, ink, and pastel chalk” (ALSC, 2020, p. 115 ) that are comical “without being too offensive” (Small, 2001, p. 414).
There have been two revised editions of the book in 2004 and 2012. With thoughtful layouts and composition, Small deftly left room for additions to his illustrations. Note spaces in the endpapers of the 2000 edition that allowed Small to insert both George W. Bush on the recto and Barack Obama on the verso in the 2012 edition.
Also, on the page on which St. George writes, “A President in your family tree is a plus,” Small inserts George H. W. and George W. Bush popping out of a bush.
On another page, St. George states, “No person of color has been President … Almost two hundred years passed before a woman — Geraldine Ferraro — ran for Vice President.” In the 2000 edition, Jesse Jackson and Geraldine Ferraro are roped off from the presidential cocktail party. In the 2012 edition, Barack Obama bounds into the room replacing Jackson and Ferraro and the sentence “No person of color has been President” has been removed. Sadly, Judith St. George passed away in 2015, so it is doubtful there will be another edition.
In his Caldecott acceptance speech, Small explained that he had been an editorial artist for The New Yorker, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. He described illustrating this book as a “chance to combine the work I’d been doing for years as an editorial artist … with the work I’d been doing — also for years — in children’s books” (Small, 2001, p. 413). Small treats the presidents with dignity while incorporating caricaturistic and amusing details about each of them. Anita Silvey writes, “If on election day you are eager for some humor and lightheartedness, pick up So You Want to Be President?” (Silvey, 2012, p. 307).
After a long and brutal campaign, we may need some lightheartedness. Some may not even want to vote. But, we should not take our right to vote for granted. Not everyone always had that right; they had to fight for it, as did Fannie Lou Hamer. In free-verse poems, Carole Boston Weatherford tells the story of Hamer and all she suffered in this struggle: she was arrested and beaten, received death threats and had to flee, all in the effort to register people to vote. Ekua Holmes illustrates Hamer’s brave life in rich earth tone collages incorporating historical photos, newsprint, maps, fabric, layers of paint, and musical scores. She won a 2016 Caldecott Honor, 2016 Sibert Honor, and 2016 Coretta Scott King John Steptoe New Talent Illustrator Award for Weatherford’s Voice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer, Spirit of the Civil Rights Movement.
Hamer grew up in Sunflower County, Mississippi, and one of Holmes’ motifs throughout the book is the sunflower. She says, “The sunflower is my icon” (Holmes, 2017, p. 45). She uses yellow to show hope and darker hues for the more somber poems.
Hamer didn’t learn she had the right to vote until 1962 when she was in her 40s. While the 15th Amendment secured voting rights to all races, states could still determine qualifications for suffrage such as literacy tests and poll taxes. She tried voting, failed, and was singled out for attacks by night riders. In the illustration above, a funnel of light focuses on Hamer, dressed in yellow, while her assaulters recede in shadow. Hamer cast her first vote in 1964 for herself as she ran for Congress in the Mississippi Democratic primary.
Though she never won an election, Hamer continued to work for civil rights and voting rights. Weatherford writes,
I couldn’t rest — no, I couldn’t.
Not as long as blacks was poor,
Schools was segregated,
And black teachers was discriminated against.
Not as long as laws be holding women back.
Weatherford goes on to quote Hamer as saying, “We serve God by serving our fellow man.”
Judith St. George echoes that sentiment as she ends her book So You Want to Be President? She writes, “If you want to be President — a good President — pattern yourself after the best. Our best have asked more of themselves than they thought they could give. They have had the courage, spirit, and will to do what they knew was right. Most of all, their first priority has always been the people and the country they served.”
These are words to ponder when choosing a candidate for president. People like Fannie Lou Hamer fought for everyone’s right to vote. You have that right. Exercise it.
Picture Books Cited
d’Aulaire, I. & E.P. (1939, 1957). Abraham Lincoln. Doubleday.
d’Aulaire, I. & E.P. (2008, 2015). Abraham Lincoln. Beautiful Feet Books.
St. George, J. & Small, D. (2000, 2012). So you want to be president? Philomel Books.
Weatherford, C. B. & Holmes, E. (2015). Voice of freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer, spirit of the civil rights movement. Candlewick Press.
References
Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC). (2020). The Newbery and Caldecott Awards: A Guide to the Medal and Honor Books. American Library Association.
Berg, R. (2008). Publisher’s note. In I. & E.P. d’Aulaire, Abraham Lincoln. Beautiful Feet Books.
Gross, A. (2015, December 1). Small Calif. press revives Caldecott book on Abraham Lincoln. Publishers Weekly.
Hoke, E.C. (2002). D’Aulaire, Edgar Parin, D’Aulaire, Ingri. In A. Silvey (Ed.). The Essential Guide to Children’s Books and Their Creators (pp. 118 – 119). Houghton Mifflin.
Holmes, E. (2017, January/February). Nonfiction honor books. The Horn Book Magazine, 44 – 45.
Rottinghaus, B. & Vaughn, J.S. (2024). Official results of the 2024 Presidential Greatness Project expert survey. Presidential Greatness Project.
Silvey, A. (2012). Children’s Book-a-Day Almanac. Roaring Brook Press.
Small, D. (2001, June/July). Caldecott acceptance speech. The Horn Book Magazine, 411 – 419.
Swenson, A. & Sanders, L. (2024, August 8). Majority of US adults say democracy is on the ballot but they differ on the threat: AP-NORC poll.