Review by Booklist Review
Gr. 2-4. Though Jim Thorpe's tribal name meant "Bright Path," his way was anything but clear during years spent foundering within the rigid Indian school system. However, after an impulsive high jump that astonished his school's track team, Thorpe launched a remarkable career and eventually earned renown as "the World's Greatest Athlete." This portrait concludes with his crowning achievement at the 1912 Olympiad, but a lengthy endnote, illustrated with tiny photos, discusses the subsequent brouhaha over Thorpe's amateur status. Brown's ephemeral lines and washes don't fully express the physicality so central to his subject's life story, and the abbreviated facial features (slashes for eyes, nose, and mouth) give little sense of Thorpe's appearance. But the theme of youthful aimlessness transforming into fierce athletic resolve will draw many children to the book, which Brown narrates with a sportscaster's exuberance ("He's . . . a jackrabbit, a dynamo, a steam engine!"). Sources and a bibliographic note are appended. For another picture book on Thorpe, steer children to Joseph Bruchac's Jim Thorpe's Bright Path 0 (2004). --Jennifer Mattson Copyright 2006 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In this rather disappointing picture book biography, Brown (Mack Made Movies) spotlights the early years of Native American Olympian athlete Jim Thorpe through to his participation in the 1912 Olympics. He was born on land belonging to the Sac and Fox Indians in 1888, and called Wa-tho-huck, meaning Bright Path. The author covers a lot of ground here, and though readers learn a lot about Jim's life, they don't get much of a sense of his character. The first few spreads establish the boy's love of the outdoors, growing up on his family's Oklahoma farm. At six, he was sent to a boarding school for Indian children where he was "taught to act and dress like white people." Before the age of 13, his mother died, and eventually Jim's father sent him to a "military strict" Indian school in Pennsylvania, where he felt "like a quail in a cornstalk snare." But it was there that, on a lark, Jim tried to clear the high-jump bar and wound up breaking the school record, turning him onto track and football. At the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm, he won gold medals in the pentathlon and decathlon. (A concluding note fills in details of Thorpe's later years and being stripped of his medals, a decision that was reversed in 1973.) In trying to cover such an expanse of events, the narrative sacrifices depth, and the artwork seems less crafted here than in Brown's other works. Ages 5-9. (May) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 3-Born Wa-tho-huck (meaning "Bright Path") in 1888, Thorpe preferred the open space of Oklahoma's prairies to the dreary Indian schools that his father believed provided the best opportunities for his son's future. Unhappy with the rigid lifestyle, Thorpe ran away again and again. Sent across the country to the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania, he found himself preparing for a career as a tailor. Athletics afforded him his only real happiness, and he discovered almost by accident his outstanding abilities in track and field. Brown uses prose and paint to show the significant childhood events leading to Thorpe's victories at the 1912 summer Olympics, where he was called "the greatest athlete in the world" by the king of Sweden. Done in watercolor and pencil, the cartoon-style illustrations convey a sense of motion and the delight Jim took in playing, running, and training. Color and lines contrast the freedom he felt on the Sac and Fox Indians' land with the confinement and conformity of school. A two-page author's note provides additional information. Joseph Bruchac's Jim Thorpe's Bright Path (Lee & Low, 2004) includes more details and realistic artwork, but Brown's book offers a well-organized and visually appealing introduction that is well suited to reading aloud.-Julie R. Ranelli, Kent Island Branch Library, Stevensville, MD (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
(Primary) The legendary athlete gets an understated, humane treatment in Brown's latest outing, his characteristically soft palette perfect for both the Oklahoma prairies Thorpe called home and the government Indian schools he attended for most of his youth. Otherwise, the contrast between home and institution couldn't be more vivid, as exuberant spreads depict the boy roping horses and playing follow-the-leader with his friends, then shift to the confining interiors where he was trained to be, of all things, a tailor -- Brown's illustration of a grim Thorpe trying to thread a needle is the quintessence of pent-up frustration. His development as an all-around athlete is presented as growing organically from his upbringing in the out-of-doors, his prowess abetting both remarkable escape attempts and his eventual success as Glen ""Pop"" Warner's prot+g+. Thorpe's tale here ends with his Olympic gold medals;a two-page author's note in a teeny-tiny font fills in the gaps and is followed by another equally thorough bibliographic note on the narrative's sources. It must be noted, though, that Brown's signature blank-ovals-for-eyes style does not adapt well to the almond-shaped eyes he tries to approximate with slanted lines, resulting in a cast of perpetually squinting characters. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Born Wa-tho-huck, or Bright Path, Jim Thorpe was later known as the World's Greatest Athlete. He grew up on the plains of Oklahoma and was sent to Indian schools, where he would learn "to act and dress like white people." Though he hated most of the schools and often ran away, it was at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School that Thorpe proved the athletic prowess that eventually took him to the 1912 Olympic Games in Stockholm, Sweden, where he won the pentathlon and the decathlon. With his signature watercolor-and-ink cartoony characters and dramatic storytelling, Brown offers a solid look at a hero in the making. The attractive volume works as far as it goes, ending with Thorpe's heroism at the Olympics but not broaching--except in an extensive author's note--the complications of a difficult later life when Thorpe was unfairly stripped of his medals. As with all of Brown's fine volumes, this will appeal to young readers with a bent toward real-life heroes. (bibliographic note) (Picture book/biography. 5-9) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
