First Mothers

Gr 2-4–Warren Harding’s mother, Phoebe Dickinson Harding, eloped at the age of 20. Abigail Adams, a first mother and a First Lady, never had any formal schooling. Lillian Gordy Carter joined the Peace Corps when she was 68 years old, after her husband had passed away. These tidbits and many more fill the pages of this book. Brief entries highlight interesting, unique details about all 44 of the first mothers, and one stepmother. The items vary in length, with more recent first mothers generally having more in-depth coverage, and each woman is given a descriptive designation based on available information, e.g., “the devoted mother,” “the flamboyant mother,” etc. All include fun illustrations of the mom-of-note and short statistics such as birth and death dates, as well as the birth date of the future president. Young readers will enjoy perusing this engaging and utterly browsable collection of quick facts about these little-known, but very important women. Pair and share this with Kathryn Davis’s Wackiest White House Pets  (Scholastic, 2004) and/or Kathleen Krull’s Lives of the Presidents (Houghton Harcourt, 2011) to pique interest in this year’s presidential election.–Jody Kopple, Shady Hill School,  Cambridge,  MA