The Golden Book Encyclopedia (1946, 1959, 1988) was an encyclopedia written for White American schoolchildren under the age of 12. The 1959 edition sold over 60 million volumes, making it the best-selling children’s encyclopedia of all time in America. This post is mainly about that edition. I have never seen the 1946 edition while the 1988 one (the one with the blue covers) was not nearly as good.
The 1959 edition came in 16 volumes and was sold throughout the 1960s, mainly at supermarkets. It was meant to give children “the most important facts of modern knowledge” in a form they could understand and find interesting. It was full of pictures and I was able to read it for myself by age seven.
Author: Bertha Morris Parker, who had taught science at the Lab School in Chicago from 1916 into the 1950s, in addition to writing science books for children. (The Lab School is where Obama’s daughters went. It was founded by John Dewey.)
Contributors and consultants: Among others, Walt Disney, J. Allen Hynek, Willy Ley, Norman Vincent Peale and Glenn T. Seaborg.
Pictures: Many of the pictures came from science books for children that Golden Press had put out between 1946 and 1957. Some are coloured drawings, others paintings. No photographs – the encyclopedia was printed on cheap paper.
Coverage: It was strong on science, geography and famous white people. It had articles on many countries of the world and every American state – but not on any Canadian province. The French and British still ruled much of Africa in green and pink. Oddly it did not have articles on any of the planets, not even Mars! Yet it had articles on things like Renoir, Alhambra and Walter Reed.
Race: It had a white liberal view of race:
On the one hand it tells us that according to scientists, “The people of one race can do just as well as those of another if they have the same opportunities.” To its credit it does not push the Bootstrap Myth. Its article on Negroes is clear about the lack of said opportunities, even if things are “far better” than they were.
On the other hand the pictures normalize white people and exoticize people of colour. A Chinese baby is called a “Chinese baby” while a white baby is just called a “baby”. Despite its claims to “up-to-dateness”, the Chinese still dress like it is 1899 while people of the Gold Coast (even then called Ghana) carry spears. White people hold test tubes, black people live in huts. It claims there are Negro doctors but never shows one.
When I was seven I copied articles from it, complete with the pictures (as best I could). Then I got the idea that I could write articles of my own based on original research. I remember doing one on earthworms. I tore one open to see what was inside and wrote down my findings. Now that I think of it, this blog is probably unwittingly modelled on the Golden Book Encyclopedia.
– Abagond, 2012.
See also:
That picture is HORRIBLE, calling the three depicted hard working banana farmers Savages,…
LikeLike
Abagond
When I began to shun white books, art, movies and music, I truly learned to appreciate my Negro self. Whiteness takes all the “truth” out of culture, the excitement, the essence of what makes that culture special, transform into blandness and dullness, applies it to themselves for their betterment and lies about how the very culture they emulate is “savage”.
I have so much catching up to do.
LikeLike
Only a savage would *gasp* GROW BANANAS!
I remember my middle school having the 1988 version in the school library (practically everything in there was at least fifteen years old). I never even realized there were older versions.
LikeLike
I don’t think I ever heard of this book. However, if a young child were to see a picture like that with the word “savages” at the top, that child will likely internalize it. A black child may think that he or she is a savage while non-black children may think that black people are savages.
I tell ya.
LikeLike
Nah, they ain’t working.
Didn’t you notice the caption on that pic? “savages live by gathering food in the land about them”… Apparently “savages” have not yet reached the stage of agriculture.
It’s the good old race-realist phantasm of tropical countries as lands of aplenty, where one can afford to live just by picking fruits off the next tree.
LikeLike
And this represents the most progressist opinion about blacks in all world. At the time (and even today) the convictions of south-americans, north-africans, Indians, Chinese, etç… are much worse!…Slavery was legal in places like Mauretania or Saudi-Arabia until the 70s.
In 2012, millions of members of the Negro Race still suffer under slavery of White and Mulatoes Arabs/Berbers, in countries like Sudan or.
LikeLike
My friends mothers old geography book (published sometimes in 1940’s) stated:
“Negroes live in hot place called Africa. They are happy and good singers, but they do not like to work hard. That is because they live in tropical land where they can get their food almost everywhere. They live in huts instead of houses and gather around big bonfiers at night to sing and tell stories. Negroes are also very superstitious.”
And of course it had a picture similar of those banana carrying fellows with spears and all the gear visible.
Needless to say, my friends mother was truly surprised when she as a very young student traveled to Paris France and met and saw black people who lived in Paris, spoke france, read the papers and were university students also.
My books at school were better but over political, perhaps because I went to school at 60’s and 70’s.
LikeLike
@Bulanik, did you miss the head of that buffalo? Syncerus caffer without a doubt, and that indicates AFRICA as well as a zebra.
@Dahoman X, the bananas carried by the gents concerned, are clearly cultivated and concerning the stage of ripeness indicated by its color either for immediate consumption (buffalo-avec-banana or for the local Banana based industry)
LikeLike
The “buffalo” could also be a gaur: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ce/Bos_gaurus_male_m%C3%BCnchen_2003.jpg. As Bulanik pointed out however, this is a drawing and I wouldn’t put to much faith in the depiction of the animal.
More telling however is the depiction of the banana, not an African fruit at all.
LikeLike
@Joshua
“More telling however is the depiction of the banana, not an African fruit at all.”
Where did you get that information from? Bananas have been cultivated in Africa for roughly 4500 years.
LikeLike
A better question is “where did you get yours?” All the sources I see show bananas being introduced to Africa in relatively modern times – about 1000AD.
LikeLike
@Joshua
Actually that is not a better question because mine had to do with you trying to discredit someone’s comment about this topic…and another thing is that that dictionary was made 1959…so regardless of the actual “scholarly” date…it was still an abundant African fruit. But since you want me to show proof before you…http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2006/01/05-03.html
LikeLike
*encyclopedia
LikeLike
@ Teddy
I was being sarcastic in my initial post.
@ everybody
There is no point engaging an expertise debate about this picture. The artist obviously didn’t care about ethnological accuracy. He just depicted the generic “savage” that the public of the time was accustomed to.
Bulanik summed it best:
LikeLike
Did you even bother to read your article, Michelle?
LikeLike
Here a biologist is despairing.
The genus Musa is thought to have been unknown in Africa in pre-islamic times, it is as un-African as sugarcane. Banana/platain are indications based on the use of the fruit, rather than being different groups of varieties. They are always fruits, but often eaten as a vegetable.
And there is no way I would be mistaken about the typical horn structure of an African buffalo, but I grant you that there is no reason to assume that the artist understood the difference between Syncerus and Bubalus.
LikeLike
Bananas did come after, even if more recent findings are verified. Michelle’s article doesn’t say that bananas were cultivated for 4500 years, it says that they may have been cultivated 2500-4500 years ago. The banana is native to SE Asia. There is no country in Africa according to Faostat even in the top 10 producers. Bananas have been cultivated, which is quite different than the article implying that they are hanging around ready to be picked.
LikeLike
Quite simple, that that the artist thought it a good idea to give the “Savages” illustration a somewhat Africanish flavour, but the artist may not have been aware of that.
LikeLike
I am very close to his age.
LikeLike
Peanut your last post kills me. LOL. ‘Widdle Abagond’ XD
LikeLike
@ Bulanik,
Stop it! LOL You’re gonna tempt me to type it out again. I can just hear the baby voice that goes with it too when i am reading/typing it out. Too much lololo!
LikeLike
I just used “zebra” as a comparison, to indicate that the presence of that animal suggests “Africa” more strongly than a traffic sign with “Nairobi 25 miles”. Look, it all fits clearly, if the artist used Tarzan comics or so as reference…
LikeLike
[…] views of other groups, especially blacks, is still predominant. The drawing is from the Golden Book Encyclopedia. The 1959 edition sold over 60 million […]
LikeLike
For some reason I always imagined Abagond as younger like in his mid to late thirties. I don’t know why though.
LikeLike
@ Peanut
Ah, youth. I remember when I was younger and thought people who were thirty were “old!” Now I’m the “old” one!
LikeLike
As they say in Africa: Keep on keeping on!
LikeLike
WHAT THE HELL??? I HAD THESE!!!! I grew up in the 90s…blast from the past!!!
LikeLike
I had a set of the 59-early 60’s edition when I was in pre-school (I’m 52); I read the hell out of them. Even at such an early age, I could tell that the writing was a bit racially skewed (and I’m white), but for its shortcomings, it was a great book for its general information, and the illustrations really kept your attention. I found this blog as I was trying to buy a set for my 4 year old. Still kinda on the fence for the aforementioned reason.
LikeLike
I had these as a child, about 1960, and I used to love to pick the clear plastic coating off the covers. I would try to resist, but after a while I would start to pick at it. Does any one else remember doing that ?
LikeLike
senda n 11
LikeLike
These days, the characters from Warner Brothers, Hanna-Barbera, and MGM characters are dropped from publication of Golden Books possibly due to the children are no longer related to them.
LikeLike
[…] views of other groups, especially blacks, is still predominant. The drawing is from the Golden Book Encyclopedia. The 1959 edition sold over 60 million […]
LikeLike
@ Bob
Yep. I also tried to resist, but then that flap would be hanging there, so ripe for the picking . . . .
LikeLike
If someone happens to have this set of books, I would like to know the title, publisher, and date of the dictionary in the center of each volume. The info I need is prob in volume one. Thanks in advance.
LikeLike