NFPB Wednesday - Women You Need to Know!

art by Sarah S. Brannen

           Visit Alyson Beecher on Wednesdays for Non-Fiction Picture Books at Kidlit Frenzy.  From her post and others, you will discover and want to celebrate terrific nonfiction picture books! 
           After reading more and more picture book biographies out in recent years, I am sad that many tell the story of women long ago, and woman I never heard or read about in my own education growing up. I'm excited that my grandchildren will now know stories of strong women who managed great things in spite of others who tried to take away their power. 

    
 From United States Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, illustrated by the wonderful Maira Kalman comes this picture book about ten suffragists who fought for women's right to vote.

             Senator Gillibrand's own great-grandmother, grandmother, and mother served as mentors to her to stand up and fight for what she believes in. In this book, she shares a few of the long line of women before them who spoke out for what's right, to be Bold and Brave.
            Here's a picture of the back cover showing the list of ten leaders who fought to win the right to vote for American women. It took seventy years! Additional women who fought are mentioned briefly in a timeline at the back. 

            

           Next year holds the one-hundredth anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment, which granted women suffrage. Bold & Brave briefly shows the years that have come before it, and the continued striving for more, including the Civil Rights and Equal Rights for Women Movement of the sixties. It concludes with a bow to the Women's March in 2017.

            Marvelous illustrations by artist Maira Kalman enhance the stories of these brave women, a book I will share with my own granddaughters!

             Here is one more woman I've never heard about, a woman whose work has sometimes been erased from history so that a man can take credit for her work. Meet Alice Guy-Blaché. She made movies—some of the very first movies, and some of the most exciting! Growing up in a nice and well-to-do family, suddenly tragic circumstances made them lose everything. Alice learned typing and found a job, with a camera company. When the possibility of a moving picture camera occurred, she saw the possibilities of it more than others. She developed new narratives, new camera angles, and new techniques.

          Alice became one of filmmaking's first innovators. Mara Rockliff tells the story of a girl who grew up loving stories and she tells of Alice's move to America, her success, and also the way her name was erased from her creations. The author's note and extra sources 
at the back show the vast material about her now, though earlier works kept the credit for her work hidden. Simone Giraolo's illustrations feel like some from the past, divided into sections named for some of Alice's movies. It's quite an enlightening book, perhaps especially for those who think Edison made the first moving picture! 
        From the backmatter! You can see this movie, "La Glu" (The Glue) on YouTube! It's hilarious!