ROOTABAGA STORIES were born of Carl Sandburg's imagination and desire to inspire intellectual freedom and curiosity within children's lives. Sandburg creates a world where children's hearts and minds are freed from “normality” and are set free to soar. The land of Rootabaga is inspired by the magic of the American Midwest. Rootabaga country comes alive with friends with fantastic names and creatures like, Corn Fairies, Broom Can Handle It, Hot Dog the Tiger, and the Wind Blue Boy. In Rootabaga “the first words they speak as soon as they learn to make words shall be their names,” he said. “They shall name themselves.” That's how things go in Rootabaga, Axe me no questions, for Please Gimme don't knows-- here the windows are either open or shut, either upstairs or downstairs, just keep your eyes open and keep breathing, believing, and reading. They explore farms, trains, sidewalks, and skyscrapers- embrace the unknown and create the impossible. Potato Face Blind Man, an old minstrel of the Village of Liver-and-Onions, hangs out in front of the local post office telling stories and is the narrative guide in Rootabaga Country. The village of Liver-and-Onions is in Rootabaga Country, and is the silliest, biggest village of Rootabaga land. Potato Face Blind Man sits with his accordion on the corner nearest the post office. With his unseeing eyes, looking out and always searching, he sometimes finds within himself the whole human procession." The lesson of the Rootabaga books is, never restrict a child’s imagination, for it is from the imaginations of minds, unfettered by the rules and conventions taught in schools that amazing, innovative leaps in technology are made. Gene Roddenberry, who wrote the Star Trek series, also conceived of the hand held, mobile communicator, which we know today as cell, or, mobile phone. 10% of the profit from the sale of this book is donated to charities. Yesterday's Books for Today's Charities ============== KEYWORDS/TAGS: Rootabaga stories, Carl Sandburg, inspire, intellectual freedom, curiosity, children's stories, children’s books, Rootabaga land, American Midwest, Rootabaga country, fantastic names, fantastic creatures, Broom Can Handle It, Hot Dog the Tiger, Wind Blue Boy, Axe me no questions, Please Gimme, Fantasy stories, create the impossible, Potato Face, Blind Man, old minstrel, Village, Liver-and-Onions, post office, silliest village, village of Rootabaga, accordion, corner, unseeing eyes, lesson, never restrict, child’s imagination, unfettered minds, rules and conventions, innovations, leaps, technology, Spink, Skabootch, Zigzag Railroad, Pigs, Bibs, Circus Clown, Cream Puffs, Rusty Rats, Diamond Rabbit. Gold, Spring, Poker Face, Baboon, Toboggan-to-the-Moon, Dream, Gold Buckskin, Whincher, Blixie Bimber, Power, Jason Squiff, Popcorn Hat, Popcorn Mittens, Popcorn Shoes, Rags Habakuk, Blue Rats, Spot Cash Money, Deep Doom, Dark Doorways, Wedding Procession, Rag Doll, Broom Handle, Hat Ashes, Shovel, Snoo Foo, Jugs, Molasses, Secret Ambitions, Bimbo, Snip, Wind, Winding, Skyscrapers, Skyscrapers Child, Dollar Watch, Jack Rabbits, Wooden Indian, Shaghorn Buffalo, Dear Eyes , White Horse Girl, Blue Wind Boy, Six Girls, Balloons, Gray Man, Horseback, Hagglyhoagly, Guitar, Mittens, Slipper, Moon, Sand Flat Shadows, Corn Fairies, Blue Foxes, Flongboos, Medicine Hat,

Originally published: San Diego: Harcourt Brace, c1922.

Welcome to Rootabaga Country--where the railroad tracks go from straight to zigzag, where the pigs wear bibs, and where the Village of Cream Puffs floats in the wind. You'll meet baby balloon pickers, flummywisters, corn fairies, and blue foxes--and if you're not careful, you may never find your way back home!These beautiful new editions retain the original illustrations by Maud and Miska Petersham, and feature gorgeous new jackets by acclaimed illustrator Kurt Cyrus. Carl Sandburg's irrepressible, zany, and completely original Rootabaga Stories and More Rootabaga Stories will stand alone on children's bookshelves--when they aren't in children's hands.

Presents Sandburg's fanciful, humorous tales peopled with such characters as the Potato Face Blind Man, the Blue Wind Boy, and many others.

Rootabaga Stories is a children's book of interrelated short stories by Carl Sandburg. The whimsical, sometimes melancholy stories, which often use nonsense language, were originally created for his own daughters. Sandburg had three daughters, Margaret, Janet and Helga, whom he nicknamed "Spink", "Skabootch" and "Swipes", and those nicknames occur in some of his Rootabaga stories. The "Rootabaga" stories were born of Sandburg's desire for "American fairy tales" to match American childhood. A large number of the stories are told by the Potato Face Blind Man, an old minstrel of the Village of Liver-and-Onions who hangs out in front of the local post office. His impossibly acquired first-hand knowledge of the stories adds to the book's narrative feel and fantastical nature. Excerpt: "Gimme the Ax lived in a house where everything is the same as it always was. 'The chimney sits on top of the house and lets the smoke out, said Gimme the Ax. The doorknobs open the doors. The windows are always either open or shut. We are always either upstairs or downstairs in this house. Everything is the same as it always was..."

Carl Sandburg’s ROOTABAGA PIGEONS is the sequel to Rootabaga Stories. This ebook is a most wonderful, magical flight of imagination that could ever be put in a printed format. Wonderfully whimsical in the same genre of Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland”, and like Alice in Wonderland, this volume is not to be missed. The whimsical, and sometimes melancholy stories, which often use nonsense language, were originally created for the three Sandburg daughters. The girl’s nicknames were “Spink”, “Skabootch” and “Swipes.” Each name appears in both Rootabaga stories, and offered here in the Rootabaga Pigeons. The Rootabaga stories were born of Sandburg’s desire for American fairy tales to match American childhoods. He felt that the European stories involving royalty and knights were inappropriate in an American setting, and so set his stories in the fictionalized Rootabaga country-that closely resembles the American Midwest-a place filled with farms, trains, and corn fairies. A large number of the stories are told by the Potato Face Blind Man, an old minstrel from the “Village of Liver-and-Onions” who watches the world go by from in front of the local post office. Originally published in 1923, the second volume of Carl Sandburg's beloved Rootabaga Stories includes tales about "Big People Now" and "Little People Long Ago." The Pulitzer Prize-winning poet wrote these American fairy tales for his children while they were growing up in the American Midwest. This edition contains the illustrations of Maud and Miska Petersham. 10% of the profit from the sale of this ebook will be donated to charities. ================= KEYWORDS/TAGS: Rootabaga Pigeons, fantasy stories, children’s stories, children’s books, folklore, fairy tales, fantasy tales, fables, Balloons, Blind, Blixie blimp, blue, boomers, Bozo, brass, bugs, buttons, cats, clock, corn, corner, Dippy, gold, goose, gringo, Hatrack, Hoo, Horse, Huckabuck, Jonas, king, lumber, moon, morning, people, Peter, pigs, Pony, pop, Potato face, Puffs, queen, Rootabaga land, roses, shadow, silver, sky, snoox, summer, thousand, umbrella, Village, wild, wildcats, wind, Wisp, Yang, yellow, zig-zag, zoom, Spink, Skabootch, Swipes, wonderful, whimsical, carl sandburg, nonsense, childhood, minstrel, liver-and-onions, post office, big people, little people, Pulitzer, prize-winning, American fairy tales, Midwest,

These volumes of nonsense stories are based on the poet's 1922 remembrances of the Midwest.