White Water
White Water is not the first picture book to use segregated water fountains as a way to demonstrate the shame and confusion that characterized Jim Crow laws in the South, from the 1880s to the 1960s. An earlier book, A Taste of Colored Water written and illustrated by Matt Faulkner (Simon & Schuster, 2008), tells a similar story from a very different point of view. Together, these two books make a stronger, more engaging read (or classroom unit on African American History) than either does on its own.
The newer novel was, a small note at the end tells us, inspired by an actual childhood experience of one of the authors, who grew up in a segregated town. Young Michael, who narrates the story, loves taking trips downtown with his grandmother. One day, hot from the long bus ride (he and his grandmother ride in the back of the bus, while a white boy and his mother ride up front), he drinks from the “colored” water fountain. Watching the boy from the bus gulping from the “whites only” fountain, Michael assumes the forbidden water must be better, cooler, and more thirst-quenching than the rusty drink he can barely get down.
Summoning all his courage, he sneaks out of his house the next day and visits the fountains again. Upset by a scolding onlooker, who berates him for using the “wrong” fountain, he slips and falls. At ground level, he makes an astonishing discovery: both fountains are fed by the same pipe! Suddenly (way too fast to be credible), all the assumptions he’s made about limitations vanish, and he knows, “I [can] do anything.”
The audience for this tightly focused vignette, which is recommended for five to eight year olds, is, of course, not old enough to know about or remember the overt, publicly sanctioned racism of 50 years ago. But if such young readers can get past the earnest, agenda-driven narration, they may be engaged by Michael’s quest and by some equally earnest but nicely researched and detailed illustrations.
A Taste of Colored Water, narrated in the voice of a white boy who lives in the country, turns on a slightly more compelling premise. The boy and his friend learn from a young neighbor that there is “colored” water in one of the big city’s drinking fountains. They imagine this means the fountain supplies a rainbow-hued, magical drink.
When they take a bus to experience this marvel for themselves, they’re in for a sad surprise, indeed. The illustrations, like the story here, are more sophisticated and engaging than those in White Water. What’s missing, though, are the stakes. It’s all a lark for these kids, and so the life-changing impact of their discovery (as discussed by the author in an endnote) may come as a disappointment, a bait-and-switch ending to what starts, in a folksy dialect, as a sort of tall tale.
Parents and educators might be well advised to make up for the deficits in each of these books by pairing them to provide a well-rounded view of segregation’s impact and, more importantly, of the racism that triggered it. By comparing and contrasting these stories, which make the same point from two different vantage points, adults will find it easy to pose questions about what happens in each and to whom it happens; about how and why all this still matters today. The answers should prove eye- and heart-opening for many readers, regardless of age.