Illus. with photographs from the Dust Bowl era. This true story took place at the emergency farm-labor camp immortalized in Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath. Ostracized as "dumb Okies," the children of Dust Bowl migrant laborers went without school--until Superintendent Leo Hart and 50 Okie kids built their own school in a nearby field. "The story is inspiring, and Stanley has recorded the details with passion and dignity. An excellent curriculum item."--(starred) Booklist.    Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Gr 6 Up-- Stanley has crafted a well-researched, highly readable portrait of the ``Okies'' driven to California by the Dust Bowl days of the 1930s and the formidable hardships they faced. After first detailing the desperation of their lives in the Midwest, he follows them on their trek across the western United States to the promise of work in California, where their hopes were dashed. After providing this thorough, sympathetic context of their plight, he zeroes in on the residents of Weedpatch Camp, one of several farm-labor camps built by the federal government. The remainder of the book is devoted to educator Leo Hart and the role he played in creating a ``federal emergency school.'' Interviews with Hart and the school's former teachers and pupils make Children of the Dust Bowl useful to students of oral history, as well as of the Depression. A thorough index enhances the research value of the book, although it is interesting enough to enjoy for itself. The book is lavishly illustrated with period black-and-white photographs. An informative and inspirational bit of American history. --Joyce Adams Burner, formerly at Spring Hill Middle School, KS From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

Gr. 4-8. Not all of the 50 period photographs were available at the time of this review, but Stanley's text is a compelling document all by itself, supplying much more than the history of the construction of Weedpatch School that the subtitle implies. The book begins with a vivid account of the "Dirty Thirties," picturing Dust Bowl farmers driven from their homes by "the winds of despair." The first part of the text records the enormity of the Dust Bowl exodus and the migrants' desperate, dangerous journey, with the remainder of the book focusing on the efforts of Leo Hart, who founded Arvin Federal Emergency (Weedpatch) School, and on the group of Okie children who actually built it. Throughout are songs, stories, and comments from individuals who survived to tell of the filth and heat and dust, of the meals of coffee grounds and apple pits, and of the prejudice and poverty encountered in the California promised land. The story is inspiring and disturbing, and Stanley has recorded the details with passion and dignity. An excellent curriculum item. ~--Stephanie Zvirin From: Syndetics Solutions, Inc. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.