What's the Name of That Book??? discussion

When I was in elementary/middle school, I read several biographies of famous people (such as Einstein, Babe Ruth, and Gus Grissom) from the school library. They were hardcover and all by the same publisher, with beige or yellowish covers. I believe they were all published in the 70s. They spent a lot of time on the famous people's childhoods. I read several and then became kind of disillusioned, though, because they were all so similar to one another, both in writing style and because all the famous people seemed to have nearly identical personalities. I'm surprised that I haven't been able to track them down, because they seemed to be quite common when I was a child. I never ran into them in bookstores, but they were a common staple in the childrens' section of most libraries.

Ah, success! I was looking for the Childhood of Famous Americans series. I immediately recognized the yellowish book covers shown at the site above.

Now if only I could remember which ones I've actually read.

WOW! You've actually solved the same mystery for me, too! I used to love reading these, but couldn't remember anything about the titles and had no idea where to begin looking, as all I remembered were the red covers! I even had a battle royale with my third-grade teacher over the Louisa May Alcott one; thank you for finding these!

I'm glad this helped someone else. Now that I've found them, I'm a bit frustrated that I have very little idea which ones I actually read. I just know that I read several. :)

They had a large set of these at my elementary school - I remember reading some of them! I had my second daughter at age 35, and she later attended the same elementary - and they still have them in the library there. (I attended elementary in the early 60's)

Oh, man, that's not good. I mean, the books are fun to read, but they are SO fictionalized I blanche when I think about them being on libraries' shelves.

You know all those conversations and thoughts going through the heads of those Famous Americans in those books? Made up, pretty much...

Yes, and the personalities seemed so similar from book to book. After reading over a dozen, I finally gave up when I realized that each book was very similar to all the others. That's kind of strange, considering there were so many different authors working on them. The only one I really remember reading was the one about Einstein, but I did get the impression that a lot of the scenes of his early childhood were completely made up.

Also, I recall reading the biography of Gus Grissom, and nowhere did it mention that once when he was camping with his fellow boy scouts that a couple of them as a joke slipped a hangman's noose over his neck, and he nearly suffocated before the scoutmaster could remove it. That strikes me as an important detail of his childhood that should have been included in the book.

I think the hangman's noose story is on the level of "Goodbye my darlings, and don't put beans up your nose while I am gone." Result, you come home to find the children have put beans up their noses. "No sense giving them ideas, they can get into trouble enough on their own," we used to think, back in the long lost days when children were not under supervision every minute.

In any case, the point of those books was not to have children learn details of the lives of many famous people. The point was to inspire them to be brave, daring, resourceful, to keep trying, to do right, etc., and that's why they all seemed the same.