I have been lost in a book, specifically Candace Fleming's Amelia Lost: The Life and Disappearance of Amelia Earhart. Written in alternating chapters about the search for Amelia, her Lockheed Electra, and navigator Frank Noonan in July of 1937 (on grey paper) and her life story (on white paper), the narrative re-taught me things about the famous aviatrix...and introduced me to things I did not know.
That happens to me with famous people (my former hero Charles Schulz is one such example). My childhood acquisition of information about them is filtered somehow, and through the years, I gather details and learn traits and facts that I somehow need to mesh. In Amelia's case, my younger self admired her, saw her as a gifted flier, imagined her as the icon about whom I had read. In Amelia Lost, I discovered that she was more determined than talented, that she sometimes got credit for things that were not all her doing, that her disappearance might be due to some technological omissions (the Morse code key, for example) from her aircraft, and that her stubborn nature contributed to several mishaps in her career.
The biography captivated me, and I continually reconciled new information with remembered information. With another round of wax museum book talks coming up next week, I will recommend this to the person who chooses to learn about and portray Miss Earhart.
You know how much I look forward to your biography book talk every year! Although my students are now finished with their Wax Museum reports, I may just have to come sit in with the next group. By the way, I know one such girl who has been collecting Amelia books in anticipation that this will be who she gets to portray.
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