ONE FINE DAY

Van Steenwyk and Farnsworth (When Abraham Lincoln Talked to the Trees, not reviewed, etc.) take young readers back to that thrilling day of yesteryear—December 17, 1903, to be exact—when Orville Wright first flew the powered aircraft he and his brother Wilbur had so methodically invented. Between voiceovers that explain the event’s significance, the brothers Wright wake up in their rough Kitty Hawk shack, share breakfast and some stiff banter—“Wilbur: Come on now, Orville, admit it. It was fun when we straightened out the air pressure tables and got ’em right. Orville: Yep. Yep, that was fun”—then struggle out into the windy beach to do the deed. Farnsworth’s sepia-toned, impressionistic scenes vividly evoke the setting’s desolation, as well as capture a sense of the era. Though likely to be less fun to perform than Paul Fleischman’s choral scripts, this brief re-creation is easily doable in a classroom, and makes an inventive way to bring a pivotal historical event to life and handy for next year’s centennial. (postscript) (Picture book. 10-12)