Author of “Rootabaga Stories,” “Slabs of the Sunburnt West, “Smoke and Steel,” “Chicago Poems,” “Cornhuskers”
ILLUSTRATIONS AND DECORATIONS BY
MAUD AND MISKA PETERSHAM
originally published by
Harcourt, Brace and Company, Inc., in 1923.
CONTENTS
1. TWO STORIES TOLD BY THE POTATO FACE BLIND MAN
The Skyscraper to the Moon and How the Green Rat with the Rheumatism Ran a Thousand Miles Twice
Slipfoot and How He Nearly Always Never Gets What He Goes After
2. TWO STORIES ABOUT BUGS AND EGGS
Many, Many Weddings in One Corner House
Shush Shush, the Big Buff Banty Hen Who Laid an Egg in the Postmaster’s Hat
How Rag Bag Mammy Kept Her Secret While the Wind Blew Away the Village of Hat Pins
How Six Pigeons Came Back to Hatrack the Horse after Many Accidents and Six Telegrams
How the Three Wild Babylonian Baboons Went Away in the Rain Eating Bread and Butter
How Six Umbrellas Took Off Their Straw Hats to Show Respect to the One Big Umbrella
How Bozo the Button Buster Busted All His Buttons When a Mouse Came
4. TWO STORIES ABOUT FOUR BOYS WHO HAD DIFFERENT DREAMS
How Googler and Gaggler, the Two Christmas Babies, Came Home with Monkey Wrenches
How Johnny the Wham Sleeps in Money All the Time and Joe the Wimp Shines and Sees Things
5. TWO STORIES TOLD BY THE POTATO FACE BLIND MAN ABOUT TWO GIRLS WITH RED HEARTS
How Deep Red Roses Goes Back and Forth between the Clock and the Looking Glass
How Pink Peony Sent Spuds, the Ballplayer, Up to Pick Four Moons
How Hot Balloons and His Pigeon Daughters Crossed Over into the Rootabaga Country
7. TWO STORIES OUT OF THE TALL GRASS
The Haystack Cricket and How Things Are Different Up in the Moon Towns
Why the Big Ball Game between the Hot Grounders and the Grand Standers Was a Hot Game
8. TWO STORIES OUT OF OKLAHOMA AND NEBRASKA
The Huckabuck Family and How They Raised Pop Corn in Nebraska and Quit and Came Back
Yang Yang and Hoo Hoo, or the Song of the Left Foot of the Shadow of the Goose in Oklahoma
9. ONE STORY ABOUT BIG PEOPLE NOW AND LITTLE PEOPLE LONG AGO
10. THREE STORIES ABOUT THE LETTER X AND HOW IT GOT INTO THE ALPHABET