All About Johnnie Jones Part 1

All About Johnnie Jones.

by Carolyn Verhoeff.

INTRODUCTION

It gives me sincere pleasure to introduce to mothers and kindergartners a pioneer writer in the unexplored field of simple, realistic stories for little children.

Miss Verhoeff is a trained kindergartner who has brought to her profession a college training as well as a true devotion to children.

It was in one of the free kindergartens situated in the less fortunate localities of Louisville that the stories of Johnnie Jones came into being, and grew in response to the demand of the little ones for stories about real children.

In the beautiful world of fairy-lore we have a rich and splendidly exploited field of immortal literature. The old, old stories of fairies and elves, of giants and dwarfs, of genii, princes, and knights with their wonder-working wands, rings and swords, will never grow threadbare; while the spiritual, artistic and literary value of these stories in the life of child-imagination can never be overestimated.

Enchanting and valuable as they are, however, they should not blind us to the need for standard realistic stories of equal literary and poetic merit.

A child needs not only the touch of the wonder-working wand which transports him to a land of fascinating unrealities, but also the artistic story which reflects the every-day experiences of real life; artistic in that it touches these daily experiences with an idealism revealing the significance and beauty of that which the jaded taste of the adult designates as "commonplace." That all children crave the story which is, or might be, true is evidenced by the expression of their faces when their inevitable question, "is it really true?" or "did it really happen?" is answered in the affirmative.

Perhaps some of us can recall the pleasure derived from old-fashioned school readers of an earlier day. With all their faults they at least did not overlook the value of standard realistic stories. In these readers was found the very moral story of the boy who won the day because of his forethought in providing an extra piece of whipcord.

There was also "Meddlesome Matty," and the honest office-boy, the heroic lad of Holland, and the story of the newly liberated prisoner who bought a cage full of captive birds and set them free. These and many others still persist in memory, and point with unerring aim to standards of human behavior under conditions which are both possible and probable.

In spite of their imperfections and stern morality these stories were valuable because they recited the fundamental events of human and animal existence, in relations which revealed the inevitable law of cause and effect, and the ethical and poetic significance of man's relation to all life.

As soon as children begin to realize the distinction between the world of make-believe and the world of actuality, or, as one small boy expressed it, "what I can see with my eyes shut, and what I can see when I open them," they are fascinated with stories of real life, of "when Father was a little boy," or "when Mother was a little girl," or "when you were a tiny baby." This demand of the child for realistic stories is the expression of a real want which should be satisfied with good literature.

Before children are enabled by their experience to discriminate between the imaginary and the actual world, they make no distinction between the story of real life and the fairy tale. During this early period a story relating the most ordinary events of every-day life is accepted in the same spirit, and may provoke as much or as little wonder, as the story dealing with the most marvelous happenings of the supernatural world.

For to the child at this stage of development it is no more wonderful that trees and animals should converse in the language of men than that a little boy should do so. Until children learn that, as a matter of fact, plants and animals do not partic.i.p.ate in all of the human activities, they regard as perfectly natural stories in which such partic.i.p.ation is taken for granted. On the other hand a realistic story representing some of the most universal aspects of human existence may provoke surprise as the child discovers that his own experiences are common to many other lives and homes. This was evidenced by the remark of a small boy who, at the end of a story relating the necessary sequence of activities common to the countless thousands of heroic mothers, washing and ironing the family linen, waggishly shook his finger at the narrator, and with a beaming smile, said: "Now you know that it is _my_ Ma and Tootsie you are telling about!" John had not discovered the fact that the story which reflected the daily service of his beloved mother reflected equally well the service of thousands of other mothers. He saw only the personal experience in the common reality and recognized it with joy. When through similar stories of daily life a child learns to know that his experiences const.i.tute the common lot, his first feeling of surprise gives place to a greater joy, and sympathy is born.

The stories of Johnnie Jones were not premeditated but grew in response to daily requests for "more about Johnnie Jones." They are the record of a most ordinary little boy, good as can be to-day, forgetting to obey to-morrow; a life history in which many other little lives are reflected in the old, old process of helping the child to adapt himself to the standards of society.

The ideal has been to deal with the ordinary events of daily life in a manner which will reveal their normal values to the child. There is the friendly policeman who finds the lost boy; the heroic fireman who comes to the rescue of the burning home; the little neighbor who would not play "fair;" the little boy who had to learn to roll his hoop, and to care for the typical baby brother who pulled his hair; there are the animals who entered into the joys and sorrows of the Jones family,--altogether, very real animals, children, and "grown-ups,"

learning in common the lessons of social life.

The moral throughout is very pointed, and may be considered too obvious by many kindergartners, who do not feel the need of such insistence in their work. Mothers, however, with normal four-year-old boys who are likely to follow the music down the street and get lost, or who are equally liable to fall in the pond because they forget to obey Father, will find a strange necessity for pointing the moral in no uncertain tone.

The stories are so arranged that they may be read singly or as a serial.

I am sure the author will feel more than repaid if this little collection paves the way for more and better standard stories of reality, that our little children may not only revel in the events of a delightfully impossible world, but may also feel the thrill of heroism and poetry bound up in the common service of mother and father, of servants and neighbors, and find the threads of gold which may be woven into the warp and woof of daily intercourse with other little children who possess a common stock of privileges and duties, joys and sorrows.

PATTY SMITH HILL.

Louisville, Kentucky.

Johnnie Jones and the Cookie

One day, when Johnnie Jones was a wee little boy, only three years old, Mother came home from down town. Johnnie Jones ran to meet her. "Mother dear, didn't you bring me something?" he asked.

"Yes, indeed," answered Mother, and she gave him something tied up in a paper bag. "Be careful," she told him, "or it will break."

So Johnnie Jones was careful as he untied the string and opened the bag.

When he saw what was inside he was glad he had not broken it, for it was a round yellow cookie with a hole in the centre.

"Thank you, Mother," said Johnnie Jones, and he rolled on his back and kicked up his heels, which meant that he was happy. Then he sat up and began to eat his cookie. It was very good, and tasted as if it had mola.s.ses in it, Johnnie Jones said. But by and by, after he had been taking a great many bites, there wasn't any of the cookie left in his hand, because he had eaten it, every bit. Johnnie Jones looked at his hand where the cookie had been, and then he began to cry.

"Oh, dear me," exclaimed Mother, "what is troubling my little boy?"

"I want my cookie," cried Johnnie Jones.

"Where is your cookie?" asked Mother.

"I ate it," said Johnnie Jones.

"If you have eaten it, then it is all gone," Mother told him.

"But I want it! I want my cookie!" wailed Johnnie Jones.

"To-morrow I'll buy you another just like it," Mother promised.

"I don't want another just like it, I want my own cookie with a hole in the middle," and the tears came faster and faster.

"But, little boy," Mother said, "n.o.body in all the world, nor Father nor Mother nor Johnnie Jones, can eat a cookie and yet have it."

Johnnie Jones continued to cry, so Mother brought him some brown paper, a pair of scissors, and a pencil.

"See here, dear," she said, "I can't give you the cookie you ate, but you may make a picture that will look very much like it."

Then Johnnie Jones ceased crying, and Mother showed him how to fold and cut the paper until it was like the cookie, with a hole in the centre.

They pasted it on cardboard and placed it upon the mantel.

"Thank you, Mother," said Johnnie Jones, "but I don't like it so well as my real cookie because I can't eat it."

"If you could eat it," Mother answered, "it would soon be gone, so the picture is better unless you are hungry."

And Johnnie Jones thought so too.

After that day he never again cried for a cookie when he had eaten it, nor for a toy when he had destroyed it, because he had discovered that crying could never bring back what was gone.

When Johnnie Jones Was Lost

Johnnie Jones was lost, completely lost. He looked up the street, he looked down the street, and then he looked across the street, but not one of the houses was his home. Johnnie Jones did not like being lost.

He had not seen his mother for a very long time, not since she had left him in the yard at play after they had returned from market. He had been swinging on the front gate, when, suddenly, he heard the sound of music, and saw several people running down the street.