Children of the Dust Bowl: The True Story of the School at Weedpatch Camp by Jerry Stanley

 

An excellent description of what the “Okie” children experienced as their families fled the Dust Bowl for the promise lands of California. Complete with pictures, it gives the reader a good sense of their plight to be accepted and educated in a land where they were discriminated against. They were denied an education until a local educator Leo Hart decided to build a school just for them. What follows is a heart warming story of a displaced community coming together to build the school from donated and scrap materials, including an airplane, and insuring that the children received a quality education. This book should be on the required reading list for all grades.