by Sam Juliano
Note: This is the first entry in the 2014 Caldecott Medal Contender series. The series does not purport to predict what the committee will choose, rather it attempts to gauge what the writer feels should be in the running. In most instances the books that are featured in the series have been touted as contenders in various online round-ups, but for the ones that are not, the inclusions are a humble plea to the committee for consideration. It is anticipated the series will include between 20 and 25 titles; the order which they are being presented in is arbitrary, as every book in this series is a contender.
Until he passed away on June 24, 2012, when he was around 100 years old, “Lonesome George,” a giant tortoise and descendant of the ancient Giantess George, was known as the poster boy of worldwide conservation. People visiting this rarest of reptiles at his enclosure on the Galapagos Island archipelago were greeted by a sign that read “Whatever happens to this single animal, let him always remind us that the fate of all living things on Earth is in human hands.” Indeed the scholar Henry Nicholls likened George’s story as one of “a conservation icon about a creature who touches all who see and hear about him, an animal whose plight embodies the practical, philosophical and ethical challenges of preserving our fragile planet.” Repeated efforts to awaken the long dormant procreation drive of the reptile ultimately failed, but the efforts can aptly be described as herculean.
The renowned award-winning author, naturalist and environmentalist Jean Craighead George was the perfect fit for this kind of story, and in a unlikely coincidence even her marriage name provides a fitting label in relating a narrative that began a million years ago, when the vegetarian Giantess George roamed a desert terrain, eating cacti and low-lying greens. A storm eventually engulfs the tortoise and some relatives into an ocean current that leaves it to surface on a raft that touches lands on a small arid and rainy island near the equator later known as San Cristobal. Giantess George laid eggs, and eventually ran out of ground plants, a situation that forced her to extend her long neck to eat tress leaves. She died at around 200 years old, but her off spring -whose necks were even longer as evolution continued to progress- began to inhabit some of the other islands. By the time of the 1500’s some Panamanians discovered the island and the reptiles. In short order sailors and pirates plundered the tortoise population, eating some, while unleashing rats, pigs and goats who helped to diminish a 200,000 strong population to one of only a few thousand.
Enter Charles Darwin, the famed naturalist and purveyor of evolutionary theory. George smartly keeps Darwin’s thoughts and realizations on a simple level intended to reach lower grade readers. Darwin does figure out that the giant tortoises on each of the islands -both different and alike at the same time- had to have a common ancestor. Moving to the 1970’s Lonesome George was found and moved to an island refuge, while scientists searched far and wide for a mate that never materialized. It was there that the last tortoise of its kind expired, signalling the death knoll of extinction for its species.
Wendell Minor’s spectacular watercolor paintings are extraordinary beautiful, bold and vividly lit, as they persuasively capture a time when reptiles roamed the earth, in the foreground of nature’s instabilities and the convergence of varying species in a melting pot evolutionary advances. Several of Minor’s arresting double spreads document mutual arrivals, while others -a stunning volcanic eruption and an ocean drift- bring alive the period with cinematic fervor- while some of the more quiet set pieces like my own favorite (Giantess George crooning her neck to eat leaves, while a red-billed bird sits perched on her back for lush color balance) visually define the pervading mood of loneliness that would envelop any saga about the final creature of a dying breed. Paintings of ships arriving to the islands, highlighted with turquoise strokes; the one of Lonesome George being brought to the refuge on a raft, and the tranquil tapestry of the tortoise in friendly captivity being eyed by a young boy all provide a feast for the eye. Minor’s geographical end papers and key term and timelines are informative and lovely.
Minor is a national treasure. During a 26 year career of writing and/or illustrating children’s books, he’s worked with the astronaut Buzz Aldren, the esteemed author Robert Burleigh, and George, with whom he’s collaborated eighteen times. His sublime cover for Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird and several covers for famed writer and historian David McCollough have brought his unique art to an even wider audience, though many of his paintings have been exhibited worldwide. In addition to his illustrations for Galapagos George he has published two other extraordinary books in 2014: Edward Hopper Paints His World (with Burleigh)and Sequoia (with Tony Johnston). Minor’s wife Florence has superbly authored several of the more recent picture books as well.
Galapagos George packs an emotional wallop more potent than any other picture book released this year, though understandably the punch line will only be appreciated by older children and adult readers. The final double page spread featuring Lonesome George in extended profile is accompanied by poignant prose that reveals the death of the unique saddle back tortoise -the last of his kind- on June 24, 2012. Coupled with the knowledge that the seemingly indestructible Ms. George passed on just several weeks before in May give this book added poignancy. The funereal mood of Galapagos George may well be somewhat mitigated by the rightful suggestion that his story is proof parcel “that as long as there is life, there will always be new and unimaginable things that can happen,” but certainly not nearly enough to dim the exceeding sadness of the extinction of a species and the simultaneous departure of one one of children literature most beloved writers. Minor himself was deeply moved, dedicating the book to the memory of his longtime friend, one whose work is “timeless” and a source of inspiration. Somehow it seems altogether fitting that the longest professional association of his career with the person who best complimented his own propensity for nature and the outdoors, should provide him with the prose for what is his picture book masterpiece.
Florence and Wendell Minor at their hometown Hickory Stick Bookstore in Connecticut
