I cheated
by chuckofish
in 2nd grade on my outside reading sheets by listing books I hadn’t read and forging my mother’s initials. I distinctly remember thinking my forgery perfect, though I’m sure my teachers thought otherwise. I didn’t like reading. In fact, I hated it. That is, until I discovered this book by Agnes Sligh Turnbull:
It’s about a smart, eye-glass-wearing rabbit named George, who visits a nice family and improves the behavior and school performance of the two children, a boy and girl aged 6 and 8 respectively. The big sister stopped pulling her little brother’s hair and bossing him around and the little boy stopped fussing and insisting that he could do as he liked without regard for anyone else or his personal safety. I was enthralled and fervently wished a plucky rabbit would turn up and make my life perfect.
While that didn’t happen, I did learn that if reality didn’t involve fantastic talking rabbits, books might. The possibilities were limitless and I was hooked. So my heartfelt thanks to Agnes Sligh Turnbull for igniting a lifelong love of reading in this dual personality.
According to Wikipedia, Turnbull (1888-1982) was the daughter of Scottish immigrants, who lived most of her life in Pennsylvania and New Jersey and wrote best-selling novels and some juvenile fiction about decent (often Episcopalian) people struggling to make the right decisions and improve their lives. That was before being good became boring. Thanks to the internet, I was able to reunite with George and now I have my own copy of the book that inspired me (it’s pretty average, truth be told).
What sparked your love of books?
dual personalities 
The Betsy-Tacy series was probably my first-loved. I read them in elementary school and wanted to become Betsy (a writer who was popular with boys). Of course!
Oh Betsy-Tacy–if only I could have gone to Vassar!!
I’ve never heard of Betsy-Tacy. How did I miss them? Am I too old?
No–they were published in the 1940s and ’50s–we just missed them!
Boy, I do not remember this book–but that hardly matters. I remember reading “horse” books by Marguerite Henry in the 2nd grade and then The Rescuers and Miss Bianca were early favorites.
Just a little side comment: Yale just won the Nat. Championship in D1 hockey! (I was rooting for them) Since you’re a PhD alum, aunt Sarah, you could prob stand to gloat, if at least briefly, in your classes. I know they’ll appreciate the accomplishment since you have a D1 hockey team at Clarkson. 🙂
We saw some of the game last night (inadvertently at a party)! It’s the first time Yale has ever won the title so it’s very exciting. Hockey is something of a sore point in Potsdam right now as the Clarkson men didn’t do well this year. I gather the women were more successful, though.