Who was Annie Oakley?

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

You want girl power? Meet Annie Oakley! Born in 1860, she became one of the best-loved and most famous women of her generation. She amazed audiences all over the world with her sharpshooting, horse-riding, action-packed performances. In an age when most women stayed home, she traveled the world and forged a new image for American women.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Who Was Annie Oakley? (p. 1)
• Darke County (p. 4)
• The Infirmary (p. 10)
• 25 Out of 25 Wins (p. 16)
• Annie and Frank and Dear Old George (p. 24)
• Little Sure Shot (p. 34)
• Welcome to the Wild West (p. 42)
• An Uncommon Life (p. 49)
• The Island and the Garden (p. 57)
• England (p. 66)
• Europe (p. 78)
• America (p. 85)
• Her Own Woman (p. 98)

Excerpt provided by Syndetics

Who Was Annie Oakley? By Stephanie Spinner Illustrated by Larry Day Grosset & Dunlap • New York Text copyright © 2002 by Stephanie Spinner. Illustrations copyright © 2002 by Larry Day. Cover illustration copyright © 2002 by Nancy Harrison. All rights reserved. Published by Grosset & Dunlap, a division of Penguin Putnam Books for Young Readers, 345 Hudson St., New York, NY 10014. GROSSET & DUNLAP is a trademark of Penguin Putnam, Inc. Published simultaneously in Canada. Printed in the U.S.A. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available ISBN: 978-1-101-64006-7 20 19 18 17 16 15 Who Was Annie Oakley? "Aim at a high mark, and you'll hit it." --Annie Oakley Who was Annie Oakley? Her real name was Phoebe Ann Moses, and she ignored rules all her life. In an age when ladies did not handle guns, she became a sharp-shooting legend. While most women stayed at home with their children, she traveled the world performing for enormous crowds, living happily in a big canvas tent. She was quiet, even shy, yet a brilliant performer. During her lifetime, 1860-1926, women were paid far less than men, but at her peak she earned as much as the President of the United States. She was one of the best-known women of her age, and the public loved her, yet she was never anything but modest and down-to-earth. Her life story inspired books, movies, television shows, and Broadway musicals. Most important, it changed the image of American women forever. Chapter 1 Darke County Phoebe Ann Moses was born on August 13, 1860, in Darke County, Ohio. Her birthplace--a rough settler's cabin built by her father, Jacob--was near the tiny village of Woodland. It was also close enough to the woods for good hunting. Even as a tiny girl, Annie loved to go hunting with her father. Sadly, Jacob Moses died of pneumonia when Annie was five years old. He left her mother, Susan, with six young children to care for. Susan Moses was a hardworking country nurse. But her wages--$1.25 a week--were not nearly enough to feed and clothe the family. They were very poor. Annie and her brother and sisters helped out as best they could. They cared for the animals, did the laundry, worked in the garden, baked and cooked and sewed, and looked after the babies. "Somehow we managed to struggle along," Annie said of those times. Annie always liked roaming in the woods. They were alive with squirrels, rabbits, chipmunks, turkeys, and pheasants. She began making traps--cornstalks stacked up and tied with string--to catch wild birds. Her father had taught her how to make them, and she was good at it. Her traps put food on the table every day. "We served them toasted with dressing, fried, broiled, fricasseed, and in potpies, and sometimes they made a nourishing broth," Annie wrote of the birds she caught. Excerpted from Who Was Annie Oakley? by Stephanie Spinner All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

School Library Journal Review

Gr 3-5-Annie Oakley was born Phoebe Ann Moses in 1860 in Ohio. Her life story is told here-from her fatherless childhood through her marriage to Frank Butler and glory days traveling with Buffalo Bill's show to her death, 18 days before her husband's, in 1926. "Little Sure Shot," as she was nicknamed by Sitting Bull, truly had a one-of-a-kind life. She raised herself up from a poor, abused baby-sitter to a sharpshooting show woman who enchanted Queen Victoria out of her post-Albert funk, no less. However, while her biography is presented in full here, the prose is rather dry and uninviting. The black-and-white cartoons that pad the book are no better. Although two time lines are appended, there is no index. Sue Macy's Bull's-Eye (National Geographic, 2001) is a wonderful photobiography of Oakley that will be far more helpful for reports and is more enjoyable reading.-Anne Chapman Callaghan, Racine Public Library, WI (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Horn Book Review

The fast-paced biographies in this series do a good job of revealing the personalities and significant achievements of their subjects. Plentiful black-and-white illustrations and simple prose make the books particularly appealing to reluctant readers, and the brief sidebars never overwhelm the main texts. Each volume has two timelines--one for the subjectÆs life, the other listing concurrent world events. [Review covers these titles: [cf2]Who Was Albert Einstein?, Who Was Ben Franklin?, Who Was Sacagawea?, Who Was Annie Oakley?[cf1].] (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.