Front matter

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The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.

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NEAR THE TOP OF THE WORLD

By

Nelle E. Moore

CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS

NEW YORK CHICAGO BOSTON ATLANTA

SAN FRANCISCO DALLAS

Copyright, 1936, by

CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS

Printed in the United States of America

All rights reserved. No part of this book

may be reproduced in any form without

the permission of Charles Scribner’s Sons

Foreword

This book is intended to encourage a friendly attitude towards people of other lands. Fast steamers, airplanes, and the radio have made the people of all lands neighbors, and American boys and girls must become better acquainted with their neighbors across the seas if they are to understand and appreciate them. Through material such as is given in Near the Top of the World, children may come to know interesting and likable people of another country, and to regard them as people like themselves, not as queer or amusing.

The author traveled widely in Scandinavia for the purpose of gathering material. She watched the people, especially the children, at work and play. She visited homes, schools, libraries, farms, saeters, Lapp settlements. She talked with teachers, librarians, and other citizens of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, and they assisted her generously in seeing and interpreting life in their lands.

The pictures which illustrate the stories are photographs, some of them taken by the author. For other pictures she is grateful to the American-Swedish News Exchange, New York, the Norwegian Government Railway, New York, and the Danish Government Railway, New York.

The vocabulary is simple and although the book was written for no specific grade, the sentence structure has been adapted to third grade reading. The stories were tested in third grade classrooms and revised to remove any difficulties that were encountered. The vocabulary was checked with the Gates Word List and the Thorndike Word List with the following results: 74 per cent of the words in the random sampling fall in the Gates 1500 list; 84 per cent in Thorndike’s first 2000 list, 90 per cent in Thorndike’s first 3000 list, and 94 per cent in Thorndike’s first 5000 list. Very few unusual words have been used.

The material has numerous possibilities for classroom use:

(a) As a Social Science Reader

The book will be of special service to teachers seeking material for units of study on other lands for social science classes. Curriculum makers for elementary schools have set up such units to break away from the more formal units of geography and history, but have found their attempts to be only partially successful because of the dearth of suitable reading material to put into the hands of the pupils.

(b) As Supplementary to Geography

Schools having separate courses in geography will find Near the Top of the World a valuable supplementary reader. From the story Greeting a Strange Sun to the story Planting of the Flag of Norway at the Bottom of the Earth, there are experiences to help children interpret how people make their ways of living fit the land in which they live.

(c) As Supplementary to History

In the folklore, the Viking tales, the descriptions of castles and open-air museums, the readers of Near the Top of the World see history as the background for the present-day life of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark.

(d) For Recreational Reading

Boys and girls, always interested in children of other lands, will find the book one to read just for fun. It will be especially liked by the children in America who are of Scandinavian origin or who have relatives in the Scandinavian countries.

In whatever way the book is used, the readers cannot fail to make interesting discoveries about the Scandinavian countries that have so generously contributed to American citizenship.

The Author

Contents

Near the Top of the World

Greeting a Strange Sun

On the Seas of the Far North

Fishing Islands

The Giants of the North Lands

In the Land of Evergreen Trees

How the Mountain Was Clothed

Reindeer Land

Through Farm Lands of Norway

In the High Pastures

On the Flat Farm Lands of Denmark

A Teller of Tales

A City in the Midst of Seven Mountains

In a City Built on Islands

The Children of the North Celebrate

Winter Sports in the North Land

At School in the Far North

In an Open-Air Museum

A Tale of a Wandering Story-teller

Buried Treasures of the Old Sea Kings

Tales of the Old Sea Kings

Ivar, a Viking Boy

Planting the Flag of Norway at the Bottom of the Earth

Books to Read

Illustrations

The top of the world

Map of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark

How the sun seems to move around the horizon

This tree is farther north than any other tree in the world

The North Cape and the midnight sun

Lars and Kari on the deck of the ship

Birds frightened by the boat

Fish hung on poles to dry

The fishing boat had a good catch

Fredrik

Walking on a glacier

A Norwegian Fjord

Evergreen trees in winter

Men with poles keep the logs moving

Lapps traveling with reindeer

A Lapp hut

Children in a Lapp school

A two-wheeled buggy or cariole

A fence loaded with grass

A Norwegian farm

Lonely little huts in the mountains

A Norwegian saeter

Matti, Ingrid, and Ole

A farmhouse with a thatched roof

A Danish egg

An old town in Denmark

A co-operative dairy farm

The birthplace of Hans Andersen

Paper cutting done by Hans Andersen

Dolls dressed like the characters in Andersen’s stories

Statue of Hans Christian Andersen

The city of Bergen

The city of Stockholm

One of the small summer homes

The boys with their rafts

Changing the guard in front of the royal castle

Christmas brings skis for old and young

Dancing around the Maypole

Swedish children in national costume

Olaf’s little sister

In both Norway and Sweden school children learn to ski

A ski jumper

Sail skating

Sleds on the ice

The first day of school

Swedish boys in school

Harold’s time plan

Norwegian children celebrating Independence Day

A seventh-grade time plan

Martha and Nils picking berries

Nils helping to repair the roof

Nils helping the boys to build a boat

A swimming contest in Copenhagen

A room in an open-air museum

Another room in an open-air museum

Folk dancing at a museum

The Viking ship as it was found

A Viking ship rebuilt

Captain Andersen’s ship, Viking, leaving Oslo

An old rock picture of a Viking ship

Treasures of the old sea-kings

Amundsen’s equipment, now in a museum