Miracles on Maple Hill

Originally posted August 17, 2003

date: 8/17/2003

Miracles on Maple Hill by Virginia Eggertsen Sorensen. 1957 Newbery Medal

Miracles on Maple Hill is wonderful! I loved it. I worked on a dairy farm on a Maple Hill in Vermont long ago and it brought back wonderful memories. On my Maple Hill I worked at Govewood Farm with an older farmer named Walter Smith and "Uncle" Miff Keene, who was also old and not really a blood relative but had lived with the family forever. There was also a dairy manager who's name is escaping me at the moment and a young worker named Mitch who like me was around 19 at the time.

Approaching Govewood Farm there were signs that said "Slow, we pasture this road". It was a wonderful farm with chickens, about 40 milking cows, pigs, a couple of working oxen, and all these wonderful people. I worked morning milking which meant getting up at 4 something in the morning and walking a couple miles up to the farm. We used milking machines that hooked up to each cow individually and then were dumped into pails to carry into the milk house where the pails were poured through filters into a big stainless steel vat. The cows were Holsteins and Jerseys with a few minor breeds that Miff had kind of like pets, I remember he had a couple of line backs. The barn was warm with the heat of beasts, even in the cold Vermont winters. And I remember in winter leaving the barn after milking where the sun would just be rising.

Breakfasts after milking were awe inspiring occasions. Mitch could eat a dozen eggs, a bunch of bacon and a whole loaf of bread by himself! Pitchers of milk straight from the barn were drunk by the huge glassful.

Mitch amazed me. I helped with hay making that summer and as I struggled to hoist my bales onto the truck using my knee maneuver it into a position where I could barely roll it on to the hay wagon somewhat precariously. . . Mitch could take a bale in each hand and then toss them high enough so they cleared the load with a good foot to spare and then landed neatly where ever he sent them.

Miff it turned out was a poet. He wrote these wonderful ballad like story-poems, and then later some free verse poetry. Some folks from the college near by "discovered" him and helped him publish several volumes of his poems. Miff loved for me to read the poems out loud and made me promise when he died that I would come to his grave and read to him again. A promise I still need to fulfill, and will.

I never helped with sugaring, but was aware of it as that season passed. Walter worked his sugar bush with a team of oxen, and I always regretted not being part of that season on the farm.

The beauty of that place stays with me. I loved Vermont. I remember one morning rising as usual at 4 and walking sleepily up the hill towards the farm. The sky was glowing. It was early spring, and in my sleepy headed mind I admired a show of lights sweeping the sky that I assumed was sunrise. . . I was thinking that the days were getting longer and it was getting light earlier than before. It wasn't until I emerged from the barn after milking and the sun was rising . . . again! that I realized I had seen was the Northern Lights!

Anyhow, back to the book. It's wonderful. It takes you through a year of seasons on Maple Hill (this Maple Hill is in PA, but had similar botanical and seasonal pleasures as my Maple Hill in VT.) through the eyes of a girl named Marley, her big brother Joe and their parents. They live in Pittsburgh, but have returned to Maple Hill, a family place of Marley's mothers, mostly in an effort to put the family back together again after the Dad returned from war, not injured, but clearly scarred emotionally. They plan for the Dad to stay there and fix up the old house, the mom and kids will come up weekends until school is out and then they will all stay for the summer. They have wonderful country neighbors there, who share with them the miracles of the all the seasons. Starting with maple sugaring and heading on into a glorious spring and summer. At the end of summer Maple Hill has claimed them, the healing they'd been seeking has definitely occurred, and they choose to stay!

The story is a pleasing blend of celebrating natural phenomenon and cherishing neighbors and family.

The references to the Dads war experiences are indirect and this would be a very nice read for all ages, including the younger ones.

Love, Louise