Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Dillinger Book Selected for National Book Festival

The Indiana Center for the Book has selected the IHS Press youth biography Hoosier Public Enemy: A Life of John Dillinger by John A. Beineke to represent Indiana at the National Book Festival in Washington, D.C. The book will be featured on the Festival's "Discover Great Places through Reading Map."

The book selection is based on criteria where each states selects one title of fiction or nonfiction that is relevant to the state or by an author from the state and that is a good read for children or young adults. The map is distributed at the Pavilion of the States at the Festival.

"This selection is a unique opportunity for students to learn more about history's most notorious Hoosier," said Suzanne Walker, Indiana Center for the Book director. "While most books about John Dillinger are scholarly or adult-themed in nature, Hoosier Public Enemy tells this compelling crime drama in a way that is educational and entertaining for young readers."

The National Book Festival will be held on the National Mall on Saturday, August 30. It will feature award-winning authors, poets, and illustrators in several pavilions dedicated to categories of literature. Festival-goers can meet and hear firsthand from their favorite authors, get books signed, have photos taken with mascots and storybook characters, and participate in a variety of learning activities.

The Indiana Center for the Book is a program of the Indiana State Library and an affiliate of the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress. The Center promotes interest in reading, writing, literacy, libraries, and Indiana's literary heritage by sponsoring events and serving as an information resource at the state and local level. The Center supports both the professional endeavors and the popular pursuits of Indiana's residents toward reading and writing.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

As an author and historian. I have a different view of the wooden gun escape. In G. Russell Girardin/William Helmer book, Helmer's view was the wooden gun could not have been made by Dillinger in his cell, whereas in book "Dillinger, The Hidden Truth, Reloaded" It has been proven possible that Dillinger may have pulled off this escape with a piece of poplar wood. Helmer claimed there was a steel rod insert in the barrel if the wooden gun that had to be machine pressed, so it was not possible for Dillinger to make the gun in his cell. However, I had a professional wood carver named Bill Root duplicate the gun from the original (From the John Dillinger Historical Museum) using only the tools Dillinger had available in his cell and he proved it could be easily done. He completed the task in three days, and Dillinger was in Crown Point jail for 6 weeks. He noted the original wooden gun did not have a steel rod insert in the barrel, it was the casing of his ink pen from the 1930's.

Unknown said...

Dillinger not only proudly displays the wooden gun from his Mooresville reunion photos, but also talks about using the gun to escape in a letter to his sister.

Francesco Sinibaldi said...

Une étoile dans l'immensité.

Une étoile
mélodieuse brille
dans l'immensité
du ciel: c'est
le souffle de
la vie, le chant
des couleurs qui
touche le sourire
d'une aimable
jeunesse.

Francesco Sinibaldi

Francesco Sinibaldi said...

Radiante sueño.

En la dulzura
de un paseo,
en el claro
sonido que
recuerda el
color de la
mágica noche.

Francesco Sinibaldi

Francesco Sinibaldi said...

A land of dreams.

There's a magical
land where a
whisper of life
becomes the
beginning to
discover the light
that appears in
the youth.

Francesco Sinibaldi