Full disclosure: while I live in Minnesota, I was born and raised in Wisconsin. I’ve always held an affection for my homestate, though I was severely disappointed when they passed a very hateful law preventing marriage equality a few years ago. In particular, I’ve always loved Madison, a shining oasis of progressive values in an otherwise frustratingly conservative state. So when presented with the opportunity to travel there this past weekend and present a DECA scholarship in memory of my mother at an awards ceremony, it required little coaxing.
Everyone knows that times are turbulent in Madison right now. The city is no stranger to conflict like the one that’s been brewing there for several weeks since Scott Walker created a budget deficit and proposed to eliminate it by destroying unions (a curious solution at best). With some time to kill before the ceremony, my husband and I created our own protest signs and joined the thousands who were rallying outside the state capitol. It was exciting to see so many people standing up and giving voice to their grievances. No violence, just civil disobedience acting as a cornerstone of true democracy.
State Street was lined with anti-Walker signs
The start of the rally.
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This is what democracy looks like.
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I think this was my favorite protest sign. *
- On Sunday, we had the extreme pleasure of meeting KT Horning, Director of the Cooperative Children’s Book Center at UW-Madison. KT is amazingly intelligent and such an incredible advocate for children’s literature. After chatting for a while, she gave us a tour of the CCBC, where we luckily got to meet recent Caldecott winners Philip and Erin Stead who were in town. Philip and Erin were incredibly charming and I’m so pleased their beautiful book was recognized by the ALA. KT then gave the four of us a treat I hadn’t even dreamed of.
- Growing up, one of my favorite books was THE WESTING GAME. It’s one of those rare books that, for me, has stood the test of time and I reread it once every year. Ellen Raskin, WESTING’s author, was a Wisconsin native and in her desire to help other authors and illustrators understand what goes into making a book, she donated all materials related to THE WESTING GAME to the CCBC. These included character notes, story outlines, edited manuscripts, publisher correspondence… every single thing she’d ever scribbled down regarding the book. My heart leapt when KT took out her key and opened up the drawer where all the Raskin papers were stored. As a creative process geek, THIS WAS HEAVEN! KT told us that Raskin was very particular about how the words fell on the page and would rewrite a sentence if it meant getting rid of a word that would be hyphenated at the margin. Much of the Raskin file detailed how meticulously she worked to get the look of each page just right. Here are a few items from the file:
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These pictures served as inspiration for the Wexler sisters, Angela (top) and Turtle (bottom).
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Raskin, who was also a graphic designer, designed the original cover. Here's a very rough sketch...
...of what would come to look more like this.
Clues.
Playing with words.
- I could have stayed for hours, pouring over the documents. If you ever get a chance, stop by the CCBC and say hi to KT. She’s incredibly cool and a font of knowledge. And maybe, if you’re reeaaally nice, she’ll let you rub shoulders with the amazing Ellen Raskin.
- You can find more info about the collection here.
- *=Possibly because I made it.
