Warm As Wool

Scott Russell Sanders encourages us to understand history as he does, by imagining past lives. He was fascinated by a fragment of information that he found in a nineteenth-century record book, about the first pioneer to own sheep in Randolph Township, Portage County, Ohio. The pioneer was a woman, Betsy Ward. Her story has inspired this one, and Helen Cogancherry has illustrated it with deeply affectionate, richly textured scenes that show the promise of opportunity, the hardships that seem to keep coming, and the strength of a mother s love. Offering a vivid picture of life on the frontier, Warm as Wool is intimate and emotionally involving. Superb storytelling and artwork bring us the past afresh while inspiring our appreciation for the vital and largely unsung role women have played in our nation s growth.