Kit Kit Kittredge: An American Girl

Superior Essays
Kit Kittredge seemed to live a good life with both of her parents, her brother Charlie, and her best friend Ruthie. Kit lives in the time during the Great Depression. The story talks about how her father, like many other men, lost their jobs. In our text, it states that some men had to travel to other cities hoping to find work, just like what Mrs. Kittredge’s friend Mrs. Howard 's’ husband had to do to keep their family fed. In the story, Mrs. Kittredge comes up with the idea of taking in boarders so they can make some money on the side as her husband looks for a new job. She worked from home, just as many other women did. In our book, it states that many women began to can foods and sew their own clothes. As well as start working from home. Women began to go out and look for jobs, even if they were married and their husbands were out of work. However, the parents were not the only ones affected by the depression. The kids faced hard times too. In our book, it tells about kids having to drop out of school to save their family money. Many kids had to go out and look for work in …show more content…
The writer, Valerie Tripp, had written this for the American Girl company. This organization would not want a poor American Girl. So for Kit’s family to be just making it by with the things they still have seems unrealistic. Many people lost everything they had. Therefore, for this one girl and her family to be okay though the depression, for the most part, does not match the book’s context. Other than that minor detail, this book is very accurate. From the men, women, and children, this short book went into detail making sure every fact was historically correct. This book really helped me put faces to people that did struggle during this time. To hear about what a young girl and her family had to go through allows me to see how common families did everything they could to stay afloat during the Great

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    They explain their true tone and message of the novel extremely well. I would consider these novels to be useful tools for learning history, but there is a silver lining to that statement. I would consider these novels to be an extra resource, but not a main way to learn about the USDA Food Crisis or the troubles of Harlem. Novels are never one hundred percent accurate, they can be very close, but they are never exactly how it actually happened. These novels can be considered “real world examples” of some of things that actually happened.…

    • 1202 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Glass Castle Tone

    • 648 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Do you ever think about a deeper meaning or purpose for a book, or what kind of mood the author was in at that moment? In the memoir “The Glass Castle,” by Jeannette Walls, the authors purpose and tone are very clear throughout the whole novel. The authors tone ranges from happy, to sad, to angry, and Walls also makes it very evident that the intended purpose of the novel is to share her story and help the reader to want to overcome similar hardships that they may be going through. Throughout the book it is very clear that the author wants you to recognize the good and bad things in life and not take anything for granted.…

    • 648 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “In every person’s life, there come moments that define who you are- minuscule moments where you’re called upon to act, faster than a flip of a coin.” Throughout Runner, Charlie is constantly facing challenges, he predominantly overcomes these by making the correct decision during these vital moments. Poverty, bullying, and gangsterism are the main challenges which Charlie faces. Growing up in a poverty-stricken Richmond in the 1910’s is a substantial task for anyone, Charlie is able to get out of it by making the right choices at the vital moments. According to Charlie; “Warmth… was what the poor craved most in the winter months,” and the poverty in the area meant that; “Some families with sick children had little choice but to… strip bits…

    • 887 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Westward Expansion has often been regarded as the theme of American history, and gender was shaped by the everyday interactions in the nineteenth-century West that made history. Westerners found what motivated them to construct gender roles, and came up with a single definition for femininity and masculinity. Even with the influence of gendered ideas on social life, Americans thought the West would offer women uncommon opportunities to reinvent themselves like so many men did. Women were considered physically weaker but morally superior to men, and they were tired of being looked down upon.…

    • 1994 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    She needed a new job now that her mother was dead, and she became a seamstress in the Garden District of Manhattan. She received five dollars and fifty cents a week while she had to pay for her room and food which costed a total of two dollars a week. Although she made a decent income for…

    • 1015 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Progressive Era Dbq

    • 1072 Words
    • 5 Pages

    As unfortunate as it is, they do not have time nor energy for school, let alone freetime. And even more unfortunately, their extensive work only procured a couple cents. However, this was not the worst of it. Children were forced to work in horrid conditions. Such as the ones mentioned in Document…

    • 1072 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Growing up in Glenview during the 21st century can’t easily be related to someone growing up on the Lower East Side of Manhattan during the 20th century. Not only was I already born in America, but I have always been able to get basic things such as a brush. In the story, Bread Givers, Sara Smolinsky struggles everyday to get food and acquire items that seem very basic to us. When she runs away at the age of 17, she is left alone and without anyone to support her. Sara working to make enough money to support herself, and study at night to become a teacher is something I can’t compare myself to.…

    • 387 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    During the Great Depression an estimated 17 million Americans were without work. At no point did the unemployment rate drop below 13% between the years 1929-1939, life in America was tough. President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) like his predecessor former President Herbert Hoover was simply unable to stop the depression. However, the drums of war were heard in the distance as Adolf Hitler and Germany were rampaging throughout Europe. Winston Churchill doggedly persistent that America must join the fight against tyranny, was finally was able to pursued FDR to help those who had aligned against the Axis Powers.…

    • 834 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Trying to get through it, some families will eat out of trash cans to survive. That is what Jeannette's family did. There's a bunch of effects that poverty can cause such as safety, mental and emotional well-being, physical health, and learning abilities. Poverty is something that nobody wants get in because once you are in poverty it is really hard to get out of. Research shows there is a direct correlation…

    • 901 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Stephani Townes African Americans in the South during Reconstruction After the civil war, the union won and the african americans rapidly moved into Atlanta. Between 1860 and 1870 the black population increased tremendously. It went from 20 percent to 46 percent, from nineteen hundred to merely ten thousand in numbers. Majority if this growing population was black women. Women that had been sold off to slave owners and relocated in different cities, came back to find family members, husbands, and friends.…

    • 970 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Essay On Jeannette Walls

    • 720 Words
    • 3 Pages

    CHAOS TO CAREER “I was on fire” (9). As strange as it seems, this is how Jeannette Walls began the story of her childhood, and a fire it was indeed. The Glass Castle is a riveting memoir that tells of Jeannette Walls’ unpredictable childhood. Her parents, or rather lack of true parents, pushed Jeannette to become the woman she is today. Years of poverty and moving gave her the drive to make her future the opposite of the life she had lived as a child.…

    • 720 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    The book The Glass Castle is about a girl named Jeannette walls she writes about how she grew up and what her family was like. In the beginning she starts off with where she is now how she sees her mother digging in a trash can. Body The purpose of the author writing this book was to inform people about her life and how some people can grow up with nothing and still succeed in life.…

    • 268 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Elizabeth West Pease was born in the year of 1927, two years before the Great Depression and twelve years before World War II. She lived with her parents, her two sisters, Martha, Jean, and brother George on Pleasant Street in the blue-collar town of Woburn, Massachusetts. The Depression of 1929 was set into motion due to the great economic crash of Wall Street, that was triggered when investors traded around sixteen million shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day and billions of dollars were lost. Even though the country fell into a great debt and hard times, the West family wasn’t entirely effected. Biff’s father was the neighborhood doctor, so her family was well supported.…

    • 781 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Unusual But Common The American model family myth has shaped the way people view their own family. The model family myth interprets that a family should have a father figure, a mother figure, two children, a dog, and a beautiful house. Everyone wants their families to imitate the model family. The Mexican American boy in Gary Soto’s article sees the perfect family on television and he wishes his family would be just that.…

    • 1393 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Decent Essays

    American Girl Doll

    • 65 Words
    • 1 Pages

    My name is Lucy, and I’m an American Girl Doll. My owner’s name is Marielle. She’s nice. Marielle is very fashion conscious, and it shows. The second she unwrapped me, she shrieked and ran upstairs, dragging me behind her.…

    • 65 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays