CLIP Review: America the Beautiful

Author:  Katharine Lee Bates
Illustrator:  Wendell Minor
Illustrator:  Chris Gall
Preschool - Grade 2

Illustrator:  Wendell Minor

Illustrator:  Chris Gall

The song "America the Beautiful" has been stirring our hearts for generations. As you read those familiar words while feasting your eyes on these stunningly illustrated books, your spirits will soar with patriotic pride!  Each book, while completely different in the way it accompanies Bates's classic poem, captures the essence of America uniquely. 


Minor's illustrations are exquisite paintings of American landscapes from all across our nation: Grand Teton National Park, Kitty Hawk, Plimoth Plantation, Mount Rushmore...  At the end of the book a  small painting of each page is again shown and its U.S. location and reason for being in the book is explained.   Gall is a great-great-grandnephew of Katharine Lee Bates and grew up with the lyrics hanging on his living room wall. He gives a detailed description of what is behind his drawings at the end of the book, explaining that his drawing of Pike's Peak for "purple mountain majesties" was because it was from that summit in 1893 that Bates was inspired to write "America the Beautiful."


Enjoy the patriotic journey across land and time as you sing through these amazing and spectacular books. America really is beautiful - from sea to shining sea!  
                                                  
America the Beautiful
O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!