A Little Women's History: Amelia Earhart, Maya Angelou, Coco Chanel, Nell Richardson, & Alice Burke

Disclosure: I was sent these products free of charge. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As always I am providing links to the book for your convenience.

Today I am going to share four great books about five amazing women!! We will start with some women suffragists and they are not the ones most think of right away. The book is Around America to Win the Vote: Two Suffragists, a Kitten and 10,000 Miles by Mara Rockliff and illustrated by Hadley Hooper. With the upcoming election it seems the perfect time to look at the history of women voting. 

This is the story of Nell Richardson and Alice Burke. In April 1916 they packed up a little yellow car including a black kitten and headed off to tell people about the need for women's voting rights. They had brought their sewing machine and type writer as well. If someone said women were not smart enough to vote Nell would type up a poem on the spot. If anyone said women should do the cooking and the sewing at home and leave the nation to the men, Nell would whip up an apron while Alice gave a speech to prove they could do both. They traveled through blizzards and mud and even got stuck at one point. They saw the nation and talked to people all over it. They rode the train when their car needed fixing and they told everyone "Votes for Women." In September they arrived back in New York City. What an amazing story and what amazing women!! I will admit I had not heard about them previously, but loved learning about them. Did you know yellow was the color that represented women's votes? I didn't. We learned so much from this book and really enjoyed reading it. 

The next three books are part of the Little People, Big Dreams series. We reviewed a book from this series on Frida Kahlo last March for Women's History Month. Today's books are on Amelia Earhart, Maya Angelou, and Coco Chanel. Each book in this series includes a story about the person's life as well as at the end has two pages with a short biography on the person. We will start with Amelia Earhart. Now Hazel learned about Amelia Earhart earlier this year when we reviewed another book about her. She loves learning about her and got really excited to see another book about her.

Amelia Earhart by Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegara and illustrated by Mariadiamantes tells the story of Amelia Earhart. This book shares a bit different part of her life and different details. Hazel had not realized that no one knew what happened to her. Or that she became famous for being the passenger in the plane. This book is fun and has colorful pictures. We really enjoyed it!!

Next we learned about Maya Angelou with the book written by Lisbeth Kaiser and illustrated by Leire Salaberria. Now Hazel had not heard of Maya Angelou, so this was very excited to read this one. She now wants to read I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, but I informed her she needed to be older before we read that one. Now I did not know much about Maya's life. When she was eight she was attacked by her mother's boyfriend and she stopped talking. She did not speak for five years!! Books however helped her find her words again. Then she began to write and share her words. She became an author, an actress, an activist and a teacher among many of her positions. This book shares the story about this amazing woman.

Our final woman for tonight is Coco Chanel. Now Hazel had not even heard of Coco Chanel, so she was very interested in this story as well. This book is by Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegara and illustrated by Ana Albero. Coco Chanel was orphaned when she was young. She was different from the other children at the Catholic orphanage. She was taught to sew and she really liked it. When she grew up she sang at night and this is when people began calling her Coco. During the day she sewed. She began by making a hat for friend and then made enough to open a shop. Coco also realized that the fashion of the day was uncomfortable for women. She made a different style of clothes that did not include corsets. And this is how the fashion legend began. She rocked the world with her fashions and different styles.

We have had so much fun learning about these five women and how they changed the world!! These books are so interesting and really bring to light some famous women that our kids should hear about. I hope you will check them out.