Scupper's House is Burning!

Every time Dad built a fire in the fire place, my brother and I would stare at the flames on the logs and say "Look! Scupper's house is burning!" It's an inside joke that only he and I share, my younger siblings unaware of the meaning behind it. Still today when I see a fire in a fireplace, that's what comes to mind.

Some of my earliest memories are of children's books we loved. One one of our favorite books when we were very little was about a dog named Scupper. Or so I have thought for almost 60 years now that his name was Scupper. In fact, when I Googled it, this book is all over the Internet. Perhaps it was one of your favorites too!

It was a Golden Book published in 1953, written by Margaret Wise Brown and entitled "The Sailor Dog."  During this Google session I found out that the dog's name wasn't Scupper but Scuppers. I suppose at the age of 2 or 3 toddlers might drop that last 's' when repeating it. But it's always a shock to my system when I learn that facts from my childhood are not really facts, just slightly skewed bits of information passed on by someone that we thought had to know the truth. Like when I learned that contrary to what my mother had taught me, the line in the poem is not "Home again, home again, rig-a-jig-jig". It is actually "Home again, home again, jiggity-jig." Maybe just a slight difference, but nonetheless embarrassing when you are in the midst of teaching it to your granddaughter only to be corrected mid-teach.

But I digress. The Sailor Dog starts out with this line: "Born at sea in the teeth of a gale, the sailor was a dog. Scuppers was his name." This little dog sailed the seas in a sailboat with a colorful sail that was shipwrecked at one point. He built himself a house on the shore where he landed, made of driftwood and other discarded items. At some point in the story his house must have caught on fire and thus our reference every time we saw the fire in the fireplace, crackling and mesmerizing as we sat there in our feet pajamas on the braided rug by the hearth on a cold winter's night.

Another book I just loved was called Twilight Town, written by Mary Francis Blaisdell. Does anyone remember this book? I loved to listen to my mother reading this book. It was all words, few pictures so we certainly had to use our imaginations. It was all about toys coming alive at night and for years I wanted to catch my toys in the act. The interesting thing I found out about this book is that it was written in 1913, 40 years before I ever heard it. The book my mother read from was a hard covered book, rough to the touch and musty smelling. My guess is that it had probably been my grandmother's as a child. And, unlike today, as far as I know, there were no vampires in this Twilight Town. Here is an excerpt from the Preface of the book:

 "TWILIGHT TOWN WAS IN THE PLAYROOM, BUT THE CHILDREN HAD NEVER SEEN IT. THEY HAD NEVER EVEN HEARD OF IT, BECAUSE IT WAS A SECRET. BUT THE FAIRY WITH THE GOLDEN WAND KNEW IT WAS THERE, AND SHE ALWAYS CAME AT TWILIGHT TO OPEN THE GATE AND SET THE TOYS FREE TO TALK AND PLAY TOGETHER FOR ONE LITTLE HAPPY HOUR. THEN SUCH GOOD TIMES AS THEY HAD WITH TEDDY BEAR TO LEAD THE FUN. DOLLY GAY TOOK A RIDE IN THE RED AUTOMOBILE, AND ROSABELLE WENT SAILING WITH JOLLY JACK TAR IN HIS SHIP ON THE SEA. THE LITTLE DOLLS HAD A PICNIC IN THE GREEN FOREST, AND THE TIN SOLDIERS FOUGHT A DREADFUL BATTLE."

My mother read to us from some other really old books when we were little, too. I still have her copy of "Billy Bunny and His Friends" by David Cory. This one was published in 1917 about 10 years before my mother was born. This might have been her book, but more likely it belonged to my grandmother's younger brother. Billy Bunny lived in the Brier patch with his family. He used a toadstool for an umbrella and got himself into all sorts of trouble. Some of these stories were terrible, when I look at them now. In one story all the little bunnies go to a moonlight dance and before they leave, Billy's mother tells him that if he hears her thump her hind feet, it means there's danger and he should freeze. "Everybody was having great fun when, all of a sudden, thump! thump! went some body's hind feet. Billy Bunny never moved. He "frooze" just where he was. But, oh dear me! There was one little bunny who didn't.  And down came Robber Nighthawk like a great black shadow and carried him off." Yikes. I won't be reading that to my Lily.

David Cory, author of Billy Bunny, started writing after being a stockbroker for 20 years. He wrote stories for his children and eventually published them in books. You can read an article written about him in 1917 and published in the New York Times by Clicking HERE.

When I think about it, the books we loved when we were little usually were fantasy and almost always about animals. I must keep that in mind when I choose what I will read to Lily and Owen, our littlest grandbabies. Last week on Facetime I told not-quite-three-year-old Lily we'd be going to the zoo when she comes for a visit. When I asked her what her favorite zoo animal is she didn't hesitate at all and responded "I like Unicorns." I told her that I was sorry but we didn't have any Unicorns at our zoo. "Well, how about zebras?" she asked. She seemed okay with that. I guess I better get to the book store and find something about Unicorns or zebras!

Leave your comments here or email me. I'd love to hear what some of your early books were. Have fun remembering them. I did. 

Love,
Suz