  | Traveling shoes : the story of Willye White, US Olympian and long jump champion Author: Duncan, Alice Faye | |
| Price: $23.28 | ||
Summary:
How Black sprinter and long-jumper Willye B. White went from picking cotton as a child in Mississippi to competing and winning in the 1956 and 1964 Olympics.
| Illustrator: | Mallet, Keith |
Reviews:
Kirkus Reviews (12/01/23)
Booklist (07/23/23)
The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books (00/11/23)
Full Text Reviews:
Booklist - 07/23/2023 Born in 1939 and raised in rural Mississippi by her grandparents, Willye B. White picked cotton, a job she hated, every summer to help support the family. As a 10-year-old, she joined the high-school track team and excelled. It was the beginning of a dream. At 16, she attended a summer training camp for Tennessee State University’s Tigerbelles track-and-field team. Determined to travel the world, she set her sights on making the Olympic team, and in 1956, she won the silver medal for long jump in Melbourne. In 1972, she became the first American track-and-field athlete to compete in five Olympics. Travel broadened White’s outlook, showing her how social norms elsewhere contrasted with those in segregated Mississippi. Each double-page spread opens with a quote from White, followed by several stanzas of free-verse text written from her viewpoint. Sometimes rather dreamlike, the illustrations are vividly colorful and well composed. Both art and text juxtapose significant experiences during White’s athletic career with events taking place in the civil rights movement. An involving picture-book biography of a Black American athlete. - Copyright 2023 Booklist.
