We began our October discussion with Todos Iguales/All Equal -- A Ballad of Lemon Grove by Christy Hale (2019), the story of the first successful school desegregation case in the United States in Lemon Grove, CA in 1921. We all agreed that this narrative of Roberto Alvarez -- an excellent student -- who, along with his other Mexican-American schoolmates was denied access to the local public school, and sent instead to an "equal" (but actually quite inferior) school for Mexican students, was an important story that had to be told. We felt that it was a good companion to a book about a similar case in 1947, involving Sylvia Mendez in Westminster, CA, Separate is Never Equal by Duncan Tonatiuh. We loved the illustrations which were brightly painted and reminiscent of the labels on the wooden crates of citrus fruits that were used in the 1920s-1940s. We also liked the pictures of the various children, and especially liked the several pages of 'Back Matter,' which presented photos of the actual people involved, more details about the case, the school board, the judge, the decision, maps, quotes, etc. What we felt was missing from this book was emotion...it was told in alternating sections of English and Spanish in a very straight-forward journalistic manner, and attempted to include too many details, while neglecting any real evidence of the feelings of the children (and their parents) involved in the lawsuit, which they finally won. We were also a bit confused by the fact that the book was based on a Corrido -- a traditional Mexican-style ballad about a historical event -- the music and lyrics of which were produced in their entirety on the first two pages, but never mentioned again. We wished that the text of this important book had been wonderful and compelling, but we were still happy that it had been created, and we felt it had an important place in classrooms, both in 3rd-5th grade, and even in middle or high school when the issue of school desegregation was a topic of discussion as a part of the Social Studies curriculum.
