All About Johnnie Jones

Published by Milton Bradley Company SPRINGFIELD :: MASSACHUSETTS
Copyright, 1907, by MILTON BRADLEY COMPANY SPRINGFIELD, MASS.
In Loving Memory of The Beautiful Life of One Little Child Meldrum Adams Hartwell (1891-1896) These Stories are Dedicated to All Little Children
These stories have been written with but one object, to give pleasure to little children, while helping them to realize, in so far as they are able, the highest ideals of childhood.
CAROLYN VERHOEFF
It gives me sincere pleasure to introduce to mothers and kindergartners a pioneer writer in the unexplored field of simple, realistic stories for little children.
Miss Verhoeff is a trained kindergartner who has brought to her profession a college training as well as a true devotion to children.
It was in one of the free kindergartens situated in the less fortunate localities of Louisville that the stories of Johnnie Jones came into being, and grew in response to the demand of the little ones for stories about real children.
In the beautiful world of fairy-lore we have a rich and splendidly exploited field of immortal literature. The old, old stories of fairies and elves, of giants and dwarfs, of genii, princes, and knights with their wonder-working wands, rings and swords, will never grow threadbare; while the spiritual, artistic and literary value of these stories in the life of child-imagination can never be overestimated. Enchanting and valuable as they are, however, they should not blind us to the need for standard realistic stories of equal literary and poetic merit.
A child needs not only the touch of the wonder-working wand which transports him to a land of fascinating unrealities, but also the artistic story which reflects the every-day experiences of real life; artistic in that it touches these daily experiences with an idealism revealing the significance and beauty of that which the jaded taste of the adult designates as commonplace. That all children crave the story which is, or might be, true is evidenced by the expression of their faces when their inevitable question, is it really true? or did it really happen? is answered in the affirmative.