This summer we went to Massachusetts for a week including a few days on Cape Cod and a few days in and around Boston.
It so happened that Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes was on my son’s summer reading list.
Johnny Tremain is a youth novel about a young man living in Boston before and during the Revolutionary War. He was an apprentice silversmith, had dealings with Paul Revere, and took part in many events that birthed our nation.
The CD audiobook was not available so we downloaded it through Hoopla.
This worked even better since it was on my phone we could listen to it anywhere (on, the plane, in the hotel, on the boat or driving between sites). It also didn’t hurt that Hoopla’s materials are “Always Available” meaning no waiting lists.
When I downloaded it I also noticed they had the Johnny Tremain film available as well.
We read the book together throughout the trip.
We went to the Boston Tea Party Museum where we threw crates of tea into Boston Harbor.That night we watched the film and saw Johnny do the same.
The film included scenes of the Battles of Lexington and Concord. The next day we set out to see those battlefields, museums and memorials.
We even stood on North Bridge, site of the “Shot heard round the world”.
While driving around Concord we happened upon Walden Pond. That night we again visited Hoopla and downloaded an audiobook of Henry David Thoreau’s Walden to listen to.
Using these stories and the different types of multimedia made the experiences significantly more meaningful for both me and my family.
And since they are downloadable and available remotely we could access them from where we were. That is one way technology can add richness to our lives.
Do you have a trip planned? How might the library make your trip better?
We’d love to suggest books set in a specific time or place or including an historical figure. And we can show how to use the various streaming and downloadable options that you can access wherever the road takes you.
