Our intention is to acquire and make available ALL picture books featuring Indigenous people and people of color published in the U.S. since 2002, including reprints. Inclusion of a title in the collection DOES NOT EQUAL recommendation. See our related readings page for suggested links for evaluating books.
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Born to swing
Ever since she was a young girl, Lil Hardin played music with a beat. She jammed at home, at church, and even at her first job in a music store. At a time when women's only place in jazz was at the microphone, Lil earned a spot playing piano in Chicago's hottest band.
Hammering for freedom
The inspirational story of William "Bill" Lewis, a hardworking blacksmith who slowly saved his money to free his family--Publisher-provided summary
Lorraine
Pa Paw and Lorraine always lift their spirits by playing music together, but their instruments are missing when a fearsome storm hits the Tennessee hills.
Someday is now
Presents the life of Clara Luper, an African-American teacher and local civil rights leader who taught her students about equality and led them in lunch counter sit-in demonstrations in Oklahoma City in 1958.
Memphis, Martin, and the mountaintop
This historical fiction picture book presents the story of nine-year-old Lorraine Jackson through prose and poetry. In 1968 she witnessed the Memphis sanitation strike--Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s final stand for justice before his assassination--when her father, a sanitation worker, participated in the protest.
Make a change
"During the civil rights movement, little Marvin doesn't want to be left out of a protest being held at a store that only allows whites at its lunch counter. When a young white man approaches the scene, the child is unsure what to expect"--|cProvided by publisher
Tiny stitches
"Biography of Vivien Thomas, an African-American surgical technician who pioneered the procedure used to treat babies with a heart defect known as 'blue baby syndrome.' Includes author's note and author's sources"--Provided by publisher
Step right up
"A picture book biography of Dr. William Key, a former slave and self-trained veterinarian who taught his horse, Jim, to read and write and who together with Jim became one of the most famous traveling performance acts around the turn of the twentieth century. Includes afterword and author's sources"--|cProvided by publisher
Sequoyah
While walking through a forest of sequoias, a father tells his family the story of the tree's namesake. Sequoyah was a Cherokee man who invented a system of writing for his people. His neighbors feared the symbols he wrote and burned down his home. All of his work was lost, but, still determined, he tried another approach. The Cherokee people finally accepted the written language after Sequoyah taught his six-year-old daughter to read
Hey, Charleston!
"What happened when a former slave took beat-up old instruments and gave them to a bunch of orphans? Thousands of futures got a little brighter and a great American art form was born. In 1891, Reverend Daniel Joseph Jenkins opened his orphanage in Charleston, South Carolina. He soon had hundreds of children and needed a way to support them. Jenkins asked townspeople to donate old band instruments - some of which had last played in the hands of Confederate soldiers in the Civil War. He found teachers to show the kids how to play. Soon the orphanage had a band. And what a band it was. The Jenkins Orphanage Band caused a sensation on the streets of Charleston. People called the band's style of music "rag" - a rhythm inspired by the African-American people who lived on the South Carolina and Georgia coast. The children performed as far away as Paris and London, and they earned enough money to support the orphanage that still exists today. They also helped launch the music we now know as jazz. Hey, Charleston! is the story of the kind man who gave America "some rag" and so much more"--Jacket flap
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