Do You Know Them?: Families Lost and Found After the Civil War

by Shana Keller, Laura Freeman (Illustrator)

Overview

A moving and triumphant picture book inspired by the printed newspaper ads placed by African Americans who were separated from family members by the Civil War, enslavement, and emancipation.

After the war’s end, everyone is missing someone. Lettie’s missing her family. They had been sold and lost long before enslavement was abolished. Every week, she reads the advertisements in the newspapers to her congregation. “Do you know them? I would like to find my people. My mother’s name was Charlotte King, and when I was sold, I had five brothers.”

Lettie is determined to find her loved ones, too. She saves every penny she earns, but not to buy candy or toys. She saves for something better—something that could bring her whole family together.

Every ad depicted in this poignant tale is authentically historical, bringing the heart-wrenching past to life.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781665913072
Publisher:	Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	01/09/2024
Pages:	40
Sales rank:	219,537
Product dimensions:	10.30(w) x 10.20(h) x 0.40(d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Shana Keller began her studies of African American history at the University of Miami in Florida, and she’s been delving deeper and deeper into our diverse past ever since. She is the author of Bread for Words: A Frederick Douglass Story (an Irma S. Black Honor Award winner). She writes lost-and-found tales of courage and commitment from her home in the beautiful state of North Carolina. Visit her at ShanaKeller.com.

Laura Freeman has illustrated many fine children’s books over the years, including Fancy Party Gowns: The Story of Fashion Designer Ann Cole Lowe, written by Deborah Blumenthal, and the Coretta Scott King Honor book Hidden Figures: The True Story of Four Black Women and the Space Race, by Margot Lee Shetterly and Winifred Conkling. Laura lives in Atlanta, Georgia, with her husband and their two children. Find out more about Laura at LFreemanArt.com.

Editorial Reviews

11/20/2023

A Black girl looks for her family via newspaper ads following the Civil War’s end in Keller’s heartwarming fictionalized account, which features reprints of authentic historical ads. Lettie, whose family “had been sold and lost long before enslavement was abolished,” saves the pennies she makes sewing and sweeping to place an advertisement seeking information about them. Until she can save the necessary 50¢ for her own ad in the Richmond Planet, Lettie pores over the newspaper with her uncle Charlie and reads aloud to her church congregation. When a Salt Lake City man posts a notice about having found his father via the paper, Lettie feels hope, and her patient saving and slow wait eventually yield an exciting reply for her and for Uncle Charlie. Alongside images of one-cent pieces, Freeman’s digital illustrations employ light and shadow in textural portraits that move between past and present in this intriguing reflection on the Civil War’s aftermath. An author’s note concludes. Ages 4–8. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

* "Keller tells the story in a straightforward way, letting the poignant ads speak for themselves. Using beautiful patterns and rich, warm colors, often against white backgrounds, Freeman creates sympathetic fictional characters while expressing their emotions through their body language and their facial expressions. A simply written, moving picture book."

STARRED REVIEW  Booklist

11/01/2023

Gr 1–4—Readers have a chance to learn a little more about American history and the quest for loved ones to reunite in the wake of the American Civil War. Lettie's fictional story covers how paid advertisements were part of individual and community efforts to reconnect friends and family in the era before telephones. Keller's poignant portrayal of Lettie's plight—a young girl who has been separated from all of her kinfolk before slavery was outlawed—becomes a means for comprehending the widespread suffering, loss, and grief post-war and amid all the transitions that followed. Freeman's moving digital art, rendered in a subdued palette of browns, dark greens, and reds, helps set the story in the past and serves as a perfect contrast to the rainbow of brighter colors that appear as the sun lighting up a church's stained glass windows during a moment of hope. Educators and parents will appreciate the instructional layers of this work of historical fiction, which centers the roles of hard work, sacrifice, literacy, and community in the tasks of finding family after the historical and intergenerational traumas of American slavery. The author's note adds useful context and distinguishes between the fictional story and the real advertisements the author found in her research. VERDICT All libraries serving elementary youth and older will want to add this to the shelves covering the Civil War.—Jessica Fenster-Sparber

School Library Journal

★ 2023-10-21
A young Black girl goes in search of loved ones in the aftermath of the Civil War.

Not everyone at Lettie’s church can read the newspaper, so after some practice, she volunteers to read aloud to the congregation advertisements placed by those seeking information about missing-in-action soldier spouses or parents, children, and siblings separated by the all-too-common travesties of enslavement. Lettie is inspired by these efforts to reconnect, especially by the success stories she reads, but she isn’t fully aware of the monumental role she’s playing in her community during this era of widespread displacement and confusion. As she learns how much these advertisements cost, “Indian head” pennies accumulate on the page, alongside emotive digital illustrations of Lettie working various jobs, attending church with her uncle, and saving up to place an advertisement about her mother, father, brothers, and sisters. Once she’s eventually able to afford an ad, the wait for a response is long, but it does finally arrive—to the cheers of Lettie’s whole church. This richly inspiring and informative picture book illuminates an oft-overlooked—but incredibly important—chapter of U.S. history. In the backmatter, Keller notes that while Lettie’s story is fictional, the advertisements are all real; they’re artfully incorporated into the narrative. Freeman’s use of texture and color gives the story a vivid, almost three-dimensional feel.

A riveting lesson on Reconstruction. (Picture book. 5-8)

Kirkus Reviews