Scholastic Book Club members emeriti will feel a pang when looking through this Flickr set:
Nostalgia for the Scholastic Book Club
I was surprised to find Rosamond du Jardin's Wait for Marcy, a "girls' book" that I read for my seventh-grade English class. I was more surprised to find the book's title still in my head.
(Yes, the girls in the class had to read a "boys' book" too — it was all an experiment).
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Scholastic madeleines
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comments: 8
What a trip down memory lane. I laughed aloud at seeing one of my favorites: "The Snake that Went to School"
Now I'm reading Pippi Longstocking and the Ramona series of books to my daughter. I didn't realize that Scholastic still uses some of the original cover art.
As Mom of two elementary school kids, I am happy to report that Scholastic is alive and well in the classroom. The "catalogs" are still printed on newsprint, the boxes on the order forms still too small but the excitement when that bag of books comes home is positively electric.
I remember "Cool Cos" and "Fun With Science," which I suppose were "boys' books." The "classics" in the Scholastic Book Club always had far "hipper" covers than the books in the library, making them well worth 50 cents. I was kind of sad to see "Bedknob and Broomstick" with faces from the film on the cover. I never saw the film, and I never read the book in its Scholastic Book Club version because of my loyalty to the original.
I guess the books in my school library didn't have their covers!
I see that memory's floodgates have opened. : )
Thank you, Sharon, for nothing but good news about Scholastic. I like knowing that this dowdy approach to bookbuying continues. Our kids' schools had no Scholastic, and the book fairs leaned toward series titles and other forms of hypercommercialism.
Elaine, let us continue our reverie with a cup of coffee this afternoon, after which we can try to enroll in an elementary school with a Scholastic Book Club.
What a great find, Michael! I hadn't seen these Flickr images before, and am sharing them now around the office here at Scholastic.
Fun reading the comments above too -- something about Book Clubs seems to bring about great childhood memories for people. So cool!
--Tyler Reed
Scholastic Inc.
Wonderful link! Thank you :)
Like Elaine, I do sometimes judge a book by the cover. When buying some of the older Scholastic books, I've had to search and buy a second copy because they republished with a different cover. It's just not the same.
Wait for Marcy, Michael? Are you sure you didn't read Harriet the Spy? ;)
Tyler, thanks for reading and commenting. The scanners of all those covers have given us a great gift.
J, that's why I have three copies of Alvin's Secret Code. The best one is the one with the same binding as that of the library copy I borrowed as a kid.
If I did read Harriet, I surely can't admit it now. : )
Flashback to the 60s! I had several of those books. We lived in Virginia from 67 to 69 and must have got them then, before we moved back to Canada. I think Mum gave them all away when we moved away from home as adults. I loved those books too. Thanks.
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