I’ve been trying to figure out how many years I’ve been reading this book. It was in the Stadium School library, and I guess I got to it about fourth or fifth grade. So…1965 maybe? And then of course a long gap where I was no longer at Stadium School, but remembered this book so fondly until thirty or so years later found a copy, and it was just as full of Christmas joy as I remembered. Frances Frost wrote four books about the Clark family of Webster County, Vermont (not far from the Canadian line), a farming family of the late 1940s/1950s, the protagonist Toby Clark, the eldest boy of three children. Toby loves life on the family’s dairy farm, and his life was complete in the first book of the series, when he received Windy Foot, a fleet-footed large dapple-grey Shetland pony. It’s due to Windy Foot that Toby first meets Tish Burnham, whose father raises race horses.
In this second book in the series, Tish and her dad Jerry are due to visit the Clarks for Christmas. In the meantime, Toby and his sister Betsy and little brother Johnny make preparations for the holiday: Toby cuts down an old sleigh to fit Windy Foot and impatiently awaits the gifts he ordered from the mail order catalog, Betsy and Toby go searching for princess pine and partridge berries to hang on the Christmas tree and see an amazing sight, and Johnny, as always, talks a lot in rhyming verses and is generally cute (okay, sometimes the rhymes get tiresome, but he’s only five). Jim Clark is planning a big Christmas surprise for Betsy to boot, plus there’s a marauding bear come down from the north to add a little excitement.
I still read this book amazed at the amount of work Toby can do–and how much he can eat! He repairs and paints the old sleigh (and polishes up the sleigh bells), shovels snow, helps milk the cows, does other farm chores–all in one day at one point!…no wonder he never gains an ounce! I can’t blame him for wanting to eat, as his mother cooks up all quantities of delicious-sounding food. Living on the farm and near the small town sounds marvelous: there’s gorgeous countryside and wildlife, and it’s a lovely small town with a cozy general store, friendly livery stable and drugstore owners, and the community has carol sings and late shopping days before Christmas. You literally want to don some warm underwear and go skiing, snowshoeing, caroling, and other activities with the Clarks and their crusty but inwardly genial farmhand Cliff. It’s like being in a Hallmark movie, but better, since there’s no little magic elves, picture-perfect holiday community, and drippy love story (unless you count the fact that Jim Clark loves his wife Mary and the feeling is mutual, and that you can see a glimmer of a future down the line where Toby marries Tish).
Yes, it’s only a kid’s book–but a warm and happy Christmas gift of one, with a couple of dramatic moments, especially the one near the end, to remind us that even the best of life is fraught with a little hardship. Come home to Crooked Valley and spend a country Christmas with Toby, Tish, and the rest of the families. This book is worth hunting up a used copy for. The Young Pioneer edition is okay, but the original McGraw-Hill version is the best.
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