The First Thanksgiving of Low Leaf Worm

by Richard Scarry

Lowly Worm travels back to 1620 to tell of the Pilgrims' first Thanksgiving at Plymouth with their Native American friends through a historical overview of how this special celebration first came to be, enhanced with fun lift-the-flap illustrations. Original.

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens, Thanksgiving

16 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2003

About the author

RICHARD SCARRY is one of the world's best-loved children's authors EVER! In his extraordinary career, Scarry illustrated over 150 books, many of which have never been out of print. His books have sold over 100 million copies around the world, and are currently published in over twenty languages. No other illustrator has shown such a lively interest in the words and concepts of early childhood. Richard Scarry was posthumously awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Society of Illustrators in 2012.

Reviews

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

Surprisingly good info on Thanksgiving at toddler interest level. The only part I'm not sure about it the pilgrims inviting the Wampanoag to their "party" at the end. I'm also not sure if this whole thing isn't cultural appropriation on Richard Scary's part... But, like I said, it's a pretty decent (and not completely fictional) introduction to Thanksgiving for my toddler. Thumbs up from me!

[L.A. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rather disjointed, but not uninteresting.

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great way to introduce the holiday to a slightly older child (4 in my case). It goes through the story quickly enough to not get boring, but also covers a lot of ground. He loved the last pages which showed the map of the entire journey with arrows, etc. It was great that all the Native words and names had their pronunciations included. While he was initially concerned about why they were carrying the deer upside down (the Natives brought 5 deer as a gift), explaining that since they didn't have stores (hence no grocery), he seemed to understand better.

[Alessandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a surprisingly good book, giving a pretty good overview of the history of Thanksgiving through Richard Scarry's characters.

Scarry died in 1994, but his publishers keep on churning out fake books in his name written and illustrated by other people trying to imitate his style. Most of them are awful, really unreadable and far less funny than even his weak humor was. This one, however, is actually better than most of Richard Scarry's actual work, in my opinion.

[Pinky · Rating 3 out of 5]

A look at how the first Thanksgiving might have looked like.