Contrasts the story of Johnny Appleseed with known facts about John Chapman. ( )

As always when reading a book written by Jane Yolen, I learned more than previously known.

For example, this is not a simple tale of Johnny Appleseed with a pot on his head scattering apple seeds, rather it is a detailed rendering of his life.

He and his sister were orphaned when their mother died at an early age. His father then went on to marry a much younger woman who gave him many more sisters and brothers.

Poor families rarely kept children in school, and such was the case pf Johnny. Apprenticed to a local farmer, Johnny developed a love of working in the orchards. And, he loved picking and sewing seeds of apples.

Traveling throughout the states, he sells and sows seeds. Sadly, he died in winter after walking through the cold Indiana weather. When he saw cows who broke through a fence, he traveled many miles to repair the fence. As a result, he developed pneumonia.

You can visit his gravesite in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Buried in a six-dollar coffin (which was quite a lot of money at that time,) he died at the ripe age of 71. Owning eight hundred acres , a horse and thousands of apple trees and seeds, he left a large legacy.

As the book notes, "Bills and a greedy lawyer took much of his estate. Anything left went to his very special half sister." What he leaves behind is a legend."

I will keep this book with the other beautifully told and illustrated books kept on a special shelf.

Four and 1/2 stars! ( )

Everyone knows the legend of Johnny Appleseed, the man from Massachusetts who planted apple trees all the way to California. But the true story of Johnny Appleseed, or John Chapman, is even greater than the legend. In deft and lyrical prose, Jane Yolen tells the whole story of an individual who forever changed the landscape of America.

I found a couple of aspects of this book to be quite interesting. First and foremost, it is not the traditional telling of the "Johnny Appleseed Story," that is typically learned in elementary, i.e. a guy with a pot on his head randomly planting apple seeds across America. Instead, the reader is given a more biographically correct version John Chapman. Honestly, a bunch of the facts were news to me. [Spoilers] I had no idea that his mother died during his youth and that his father remarried to have many other children. While I was familiar with the image of the man - a pot on the head and a potato sack onesie - I did not know that planting apple seeds was his business. He did not only proliferate the crop across the country, but he grew and sold them for livelihood. Again, news to me.

The book is also written in form of free verse poetry. While my own opinion on this form is on the negative end of the spectrum (It reads like prose!), I do recognize it as a valid form, and one that should be taught. This book provides for both biographical and poetry lessons. Students love to write in free verse, as it is unrestricted and therefore easier. This book could foray into an assignment in which students read a biography of their choice, and then write their own free verse poem on their subject.

As for theme, I struggle to find one. It is written as a biographical piece, really lacking any bias. ( )

“Johnny Apple Seed” is a historic realism story. The story tell the legend of Johnny apple seed in poems, at the end of the poem there is a short summary of actual facts about Johnny apple seed. Each page is a different poem. The illustrations are muted which give a feeling that this happened a long time ago and each illustration works well with each poem.
Person Reflection
I like how the author bought legend and history together in this book. The Legend is told in poem form and the history was brought in at the end of each poem to support it. The illustrations are drawn in sepia tones to give and age to the poems and history.
Extension ideas
I would have the students make Johnny Apple Seed and write what they like the most about him.
I would have the students plant a seed and watch it grow. ( )