New Arrival: Picture Book Biography: Miss Mary Reporting, by Sue Macy & C. F. Payne

Miss Mary Reporting: The True Story of Sportswriter Mary Garber
Sue Macy, illustrated by C. F. Payne
ISBN: 9781481401203
Slightly caricatured figures in muted "historical" tones match the lively but respectful tone of the story.

I don't have much to do with sports; my family isn't involved or interested in them, we don't have a "team" in any sport, let alone the great American requirements like football or baseball.  I am generally aware that there are major sports rivalries, but the only one I know of for sure is the one in my own state, for football.  I'm sure that my general ignorance is amazing to some people, but usually it doesn't impact my life.  I go through my days in a blissfully unaware non-sporting haze.

This book was a rare hiccup in that bliss. I have a thing for picture book nonfiction.  I think that it's a beautiful and underappreciated way to introduce young kids to history in a non-boring, non-pedantic, non-TEXTBOOK delivery.  And this sort of history is EXACTLY what I would have loved to learn about; a scrappy little girl who wasn't interested in "girly" things, and enjoyed doing what her daddy did (in my case it was cars, in hers; sports) and shoved her way into and up to the top of a profession and an environment that was not only unwelcoming, but actively discouraging.  The pictures always emphasize her height - well, the lack of height - but the funny thing is that despite being so petite, she's always the central focus of the composition, and one gets the impression that once she started rolling, she really was the central focus of wherever she went.  Highlights for me were that she gave attention and press time to the segregated games for the Black community, that she continued in her career until she was EIGHTY-freaking-SIX years old, and that she regularly credited her sister Neely for being the "mother" figure who stayed at home and kept the household running so that she could do the job in a man's world that she wanted to do.

An excellent book about an excellent lady who I had never heard about, and now I'm very glad that I have made her acquaintance, and I think the writer/illustrator duo here has done a bang-up job bringing her passion and perseverance to life.