He finds work and shelter in Fredericksburg, Virginia, just as the Rebel troops begin to amass in preparation for a confrontation with the Union Army. Rufus befriends several Confederate officers, who do not believe the Confederate army can be beaten, and sensitively observes and records the gripping battle that takes place there.

    Jackson, a young farmer whose family is forced to abandon their farm and seek a new life in California. April 10, 1935 The dust has been blowing bad for several years in a row now. And with crop failures coming back to back like they have, hundreds of families have lost their farms. A Monday never passes without Sheriff Jake Allison posting a notice of foreclosure at the Boise City courthouse. Times are so rough, that when they hold an auction to sell a place, the only people that show up are the banks and the insurance companies. Nobody else has a nickel. C.J. Jackson is a young man living through one of the most tragic times in the Dust Bowl of an America fraught with political, economic, and environmental problems. In this intense journal of life in the Oklahoma panhandle, C.J. tells it like it is-and it is bad.

    He is "adopted" by the Henshaw family, who allow him to travel in their wagon in exchange for his help with the daily maintenance work along the way. Jedediah's adventures, along with the friends he makes and the lessons he learns, make for an unforgettable story of a brave young boy who sets off to discover a wild, new world.

    When Finn Reardon's father dies, he decides to support his mother and eight siblings by peddling newspapers on the streets corners of New York City. But when the two biggest newspaper publishers, Hearst and Pulitzer, raise the wholesale price that Finn and his friends pay for the papers they sell, the boys band together and go on strike. Susan Campbell Bartoletti brings humor and wit to this classic David and Goliath struggle between the Newsies and the newspaper publishers.

    The journal of Biddy Owens, a batboy for the Birmingham Black Barons, one of the best teams in the Negro Leagues, describes some of the greatest ball players of the game as Biddy's story covers the games, road trips, racial segregation, and day-to-day life in Birmingham.

    Eager to strike out on his own, Gus joins Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery on their journey from Missouri to the Pacific Ocean as the youngest member of the trip.

    Douglas Deeds, a fifteen-year-old orphan, keeps a journal of his travels by wagon train as a member of the ill-fated Donner Party, which became stranded in the Sierra Nevada mountains in the winter of 1846-47.

    Promising religious freedom and fertile land, Polly's father, Reverend Rodgers, moves their Baptist community from England to the Minnesota prairie. After a treacherous journey across the sea and across this country, Polly finds that it is no paradise at all. Written with incredible heart and compassion, insight and sensitivity, Marion Dane Bauer has created one of the most sophisticated and courageous characters Dear America has seen.

    As they cross the Great Plains of the midwestern prairie, fording rivers and climbing mountains, the Ryders encounter endless hardship as they undertake this great adventure.

    An agonizing dilemma plagues these brother-sister diarists. He is a Marine stationed in Vietnam. She is at home in America, far away from her brother's war zone, fighting for peace. As the marine writes in his journal about his experiences as a soldier, fighting an enemy he can't see, his siter seeks peace. In these gripping installments of DEAR AMERICA and MY NAME IS AMERICA, Ellen Emerson White captures the unique time period when America was at war both in a far-off place, and at home where adults and children alike marched in the streets for peace and freedo. Poignant and comlex, these two characters will give readers glimpse into perhaps the most tumultuous time in modern American history.

    Renowned historical fiction writer Ann Rinaldi presents the story of Jasper, a 14-year-old Pilgrim who makes his mark at Plymouth by establishing a friendship with the Nauset Indians.

    Fierce, dust-filled winds ravage the plains and threaten the town's agricultural livelihood, creating poverty and despair among Grace's neighbors. Will her family's farm survive?

    Army in 1864 New Mexico.

    For almost 11 months in the internment camp, 12-year-old Ben Uchida keeps a journal and he writes, "It never seemed to matter before, but now my face was the face of the enemy".

    As her masters are torn between their own nationality and their somewhat reluctant new allegiance to the British colonial government, Zettie, too, must reconsider her own loyalties.