When my own children were beginning to be interested in juvenile
literature, they found great pleasure in reading again and again "The
William Henry Letters" and other stories by Mrs. Abby Morton Diaz. On
making inquiry I was much gratified to learn that Mrs. Diaz was our Abby
Morton of the Brook Farm Kindergarten. It was no wonder she could write
letters and stories appealing to children. Her understanding and her
sympathies brought her in close touch with them. She knew their minds
and their hearts, their likes and their dislikes and what she wrote of
them and for them they accepted, knowing that every word was true to
nature. It is observable too, that in her writings she still holds to
the purpose of illustrating to her young readers the necessity of early
acquiring the habit of paying attention.
Brook Farm was practically an industrial school, though not so named. It
was the first I ever heard of where instruction in the useful arts was
regularly given as a part of the educational course.
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