Field - Buttercup Gold - Keeping the Public inPublic Domain

We all have things we wish we could go back and ask people who are no longer with us.  My mother would visit me in the spring and shout "THE OLD MAN SPILLED HIS BAG OF GOLD!" upon seeing our fields covered in dandelions.  

After she was gone and once again we were painted with dandelions, I found myself wondering who this Old Man was and why he spilled his Bag of Gold?  I felt sure it was something she read as a child, possibly in school, so that other people from her generation would also know it.  I've asked about the Old Man and that Bag of Gold for years.  I always mentioned dandelions.  Nobody spoke up.

https://x.com/VenetiaJane

Venetia Jane, THANK YOU!  I never would have found it as the original was not about dandelions, but buttercups! She wrote on her X account for VenetiaJane's Garden back on May 10 2023:A tale tells of a greedy man who found the pot of gold hidden at the end of the rainbow. Hastily he carried the gold away but it fell through a hole in his bag, scattering amongst the grass where it was transformed into fields of golden buttercups by the fairies #FolkloreThursday Her glorious photography would have been loved by my mother.

YES!

I found it's from Ellen Robena Field's Buttercup Gold, and Other Stories (1894) -- definitely before even my mom, but the book it comes from would have been considered a classic when she was a child

It's at Project Gutenberg (it's a text only and feels a bit dry).  I like a pdf version I found online which is done with a bit more style than just the text.  Unfortunately that pdf doesn't reproduce larger online for easy reading. 

 

The actual text is:

Did you ever hear of the pot of gold hidden at the end of the rainbow? Some people think it is there now, but they are mistaken, for a long time ago somebody found it. How he happened to find it, nobody knows, for a great many people have searched in vain, and have never even been able to discover that the rainbow has any ends at all. The man who found it was very selfish and did not want anybody to know, for fear they might want some of his money. So one night he put it in a bag, which he slung over his shoulder, and walked across the fields toward a thick wood where he meant to hide it.

In the bag was something beside the gold—something so small that the greedy man in his hurry had not noticed it. It was a hole, and, as he walked on, one by one the gold coins fell out into the grass. When he reached the wood and found all of his money gone, he hurried back to search for it, but something strange had happened. It was a midsummer night, and the fairies were having a dance out in the meadows. They were good, loving little people, and despised selfishness above everything. One little fairy spied the glittering gold among the grasses. She had seen the greedy man passing by, and knew he would soon be back to hunt for his treasure. “It will do him no good,” she said, “if he hides it away, and neither will it help anybody else. I will change it into something that will give joy to rich and poor.”

When the greedy man reached the meadow he could see no gold money, but in its place were bright, yellow flowers—buttercup gold for the children.

***

If you go to this link you also can hear it and find a student activity which looks at that old man and why he became the man in the story.  I especially like the activity incorporating the fairy and his effort to understand the old man's behavior.  

 

Since actual buttercups aren't in the student activity, I'd reproduce or send them to VenetiaJane's work and also spend some time on buttercups.  Unfortunately that includes "Everything you need to know about buttercups" including the fact they "are considered poisonous and may cause dermatitis, or skin irritation."  It discusses the various types of buttercups and talks about their tendency to become invasive.  Whether buttercups or dandelions I know they spread easily...just like the old man's gold, the very thing causing my mother's exuberant rejoicing!

 

Field's entire book is similarly accessed at Lit2Go by searching the author's name.  No credit is given to the illustrator of each poem and story activity, but they are much more visually friendly as well as offering activities and an audio file.  As Lit2Go explains: 

Lit2Go is a free online collection of stories and poems in Mp3 (audiobook) format. An abstract, citation, playing time, and word count are given for each of the passages. Many of the passages also have a related reading strategy identified. Each reading passage can also be downloaded as a PDF and printed for use as a read-along or as supplemental reading material for your classroom.

The Florida Center for Instructional Technology produces more than just Lit2Go, offering among other digital resources,  "over 100,000 pieces of free digital content for non-commercial classroom use by students and teachers."  That includes a huge collection of royalty-free photos, maps, and illustrations.  Take a look at that home page link.  Right now it looks at resources (mainly historical or literary) for the months of June and July.  I am so impressed with their work that I subscribed to their newsletter.  I'm certain it will be worthwhile both in storytelling and here on this blog!

For those wanting the actual book it has been reprinted if you want to buy it.  The reprint book gives this offiffiffic'al information:

The book "Buttercup Gold, and Other Stories " has been considered important throughout the human history, and so that this work is never forgotten we have made efforts in its preservation by republishing this book in a modern format for present and future generations. This whole book has been reformatted, retyped and designed. These books are not made of scanned copies and hence the text is clear and readable.

Product Details

ISBN: 9789356153639
ISBN-10: 9356153639
Publisher: Alpha Edition
Publication Date: May 17th, 2022
Pages: 32

Such a slender work has influenced readers from before the Twentieth Century.

Now for yet another mystery, besides dandelions the gold spreading as rapidly on my lawn is not a buttercup, it has a large number of tiny petals.  Just in case it, too, can cause skin irritation, I will use gloves harvesting one to show a naturalist for identification.

After the years pondering the mystery mom left me, why not another?

*************

This is part of a series of postings of stories under the category, "Keeping the Public in Public Domain."  The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated.  I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20th century.  My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them.  I hope you enjoy discovering new stories.  

At the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an audience.  Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing of Public Domain stories will not occur that week.  This is a return to my regular posting of a research project here.  (Don't worry, this isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future storytelling to an audience.)  Response has convinced me that "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other postings as often as I can manage it.

Other Public Domain story resources I recommend-

• There are many online resources for Public Domain stories, maybe none for folklore is as ambitious as fellow storyteller, Yoel Perez's database, Yashpeh, the International Folktales Collection.  I have long recommended it and continue to do so.  He has loaded Stith Thompson's Motif Index into his server as a database so you can search the whole 6 volumes for whatever word or expression you like by pressing one key. http://folkmasa.org/motiv/motif.htm

• You may have noticed I'm no longer certain Dr. Perez has the largest database, although his offering the Motif Index certainly qualifies for those of us seeking specific types of stories.  There's another site, FairyTalez claiming to be the largest, with "over 2000 fairy tales, folktales, and fables" and they are "fully optimized for phones, tablets, and PCs", free and presented without ads.
  Between those two sites, there is much for story-lovers, but as they say in infomercials, "Wait, there's more!"

The email list for storytellers, Storytell, discussed Online Story Sources and came up with these additional suggestions:        

         - David K. Brown - http://people.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/stories.html

         - Karen Chace - http://karenchace.blogspot.com/search?q=public+domain

         - Richard Martin - http://www.tellatale.eu/tales_page.html

         - Spirit of Trees - http://spiritoftrees.org/featured-folktales

         - Story-Lovers - http://www.story-lovers.com/ is now only accessible through the Wayback Machine, described below, but the late Jackie Baldwin's wonderful site lives on there, fully searchable manually (the Google search doesn't work), at https://archive.org/ .  It's not easy, but go to Story-lovers.com snapshot for December 22 2016  and you can click on SOS: Searching Out Stories to scroll down through the many story topics and click on the story topic that interests you.

       - Tim Sheppard - http://www.timsheppard.co.uk/story/storylinks.html

       - World of Tales - http://www.worldoftales.com/ 

 
           - Zalka Csenge Virag - http://multicoloreddiary.blogspot.com doesn't give the actual stories, but her recommendations, working her way through each country on a continent, give excellent ideas for finding new books and stories to love and tell.

     
You're going to find many of the links on these sites have gone down, BUT go to the Internet Archive Wayback Machine to find some of these old links.  Tim's site, for example, is so huge probably updating it would be a full-time job.  In the case of Story-Lovers, it's great that Jackie Baldwin set it up to stay online as long as it did after she could no longer maintain it.  Possibly searches maintained it.  Unfortunately Storytell list member, Papa Joe is on both Tim Sheppard's site and Story-Lovers, but he no longer maintains his old Papa Joe's Traveling Storytelling Show website and his Library (something you want to see!) is now only on the Wayback Machine.  It took some patience working back through claims of snapshots but finally in December of 2006 it appears!

Somebody as of this writing whose stories can still be found by his website is the late Chuck Larkin - http://chucklarkin.com/stories.html.  I prefer to list these sites by their complete address so they can be found by the Wayback Machine, a.k.a. Archive.org, when that becomes the only way to find them.

You can see why I recommend these to you. 

Have fun discovering even more stories

Simon Brooks - The State of Mind

Today's blog is for performers, teachers, librarians, and parents about a situation we all should know about and be prepared to handle.  

Fellow storyteller out in the New England area, Simon Brooks, has expanded an article I saw initially on Storytell (email list for storytellers).  I said I planned to share it with fellow performers for Michigan Arts Access which brings the arts to people of all ages with disabilities as I knew we would soon be gathering to prepare for returning to classrooms that were affected by the pandemic.  Even beyond that I see a far wider need and asked him if he would let me reprint it here.  We also talked about how it related to an earlier blog article, from April Fools Day! of this year, that he wrote and it seemed to contradict it a bit.  The result has graciously been given for me to show here.  Simon even says it's a ten minute read.  They will be well spent!

June 23, 2022

The State of Mind

News, Stories, Schools

This is a ten minute read about what I am seeing going back in-person, into schools and other community events.

Back in April 2022, as you may or may not have read, I had what I felt was my first real gig back in-person for a long time. It was certainly the first time since March 2020 where I was not 20 feet from the first row. It was certainly the first time since March 2020 where most folks were maskless and I was not wearing a mask, or a face shield. It was the first time I had had three large presentations to different groups of kids since the pandemic began. There was this wonderful, euphoric feeling of togetherness. It felt like a normal presentation – well three! The kids had been prepped on behaviour, there was some silliness, as it was the first event at the school with “an outsider” since March 2020, and it all felt wonderful and thrilling!

Since then, I have done a number of other first events as a visiting guest. Some have gone really well, others have been a little challenging. I am writing this because there are some folks, some performers out there who have not physically visited, in-person, a venue since March 2020, and things, I believe, have changed since then.

The amount of time people have been actively engaged in technology since the pandemic began – screen time, the amount of time people have been distracted by virtual meetings and calls, children who need help, and not being able to go outside and play to a large degree, has been huge, and at the end of the day many of us just vegged in front of a box or device. This has had a severe effect on not just kids, but everyone. I think we need to participate in a lot less digital engagement. AND I THINK WE NEED TO ADDRESS THIS WITH PARENTS AND CARE GIVERS WHEN WE HAVE ACCESS TO THEM! We need to take time out for ourselves as humans, to disengage from digital content and seriously get back to analogue.

I am not a Luddite! I am NOT calling for people to throw out their devices, or run into schools and businesses and destroy computers and the like! I am suggesting that we step away from them for a while, go on a digital vacation, to some degree! Put devices in a time-out box!

I have been in schools on and off since the pandemic began, and since the beginning of 2022, have been regularly back in, in-person and I am seeing a difference in child behavior. This is at the elementary level, and middle school level. I am also seeing this with my own high school aged daughter and her friends - she is 17 and will start her final year of high school at the end of the summer. When I originally posted this as a letter to listservs I am on, I have heard back from others, including Milbre Burch who said: “I’ve seen what you describe from first graders to Masters students.”

I have presented Gilgamesh to sixth graders at a local school many times prior to 2019. The kids were spellbound by the story (and hopefully the telling). I presented it (at the same school) virtually, via streaming media during COVID. Because it was streamed, I have no real idea of how students were engaged those two years.

This April of 2022, I took Gilgamesh back to the school, in-person, in front of 6th graders. Same school with the same teachers, although in a different space. The reception was totally different. Lack of focus, getting up, whispering to friends next to each other were all happening which never happened in 2019 and the years prior to that. I had worked on Gilgamesh, probably more this year than in the past, and put a lot more work into being as engaging as possible, both with physicality and with word choices. And dramatic action! What I found was that the 'same' 6th grade students were behaving like 4th graders.

This is not my only experience this year. I have been into a number of schools, and performed at community events and found, to more or less a similar extent, children, students especially in elementary and middle school, have little attention span at all. I put a lot of this down to being remote for two years; having parents working from home, trying to work and engage the kids, and help them where possible. I imagine there was a lot of  - go play on your device, go watch a movie. Being stuck indoors for much of the first year, there was little play, little reading, just a lot of screen time. Habit forming, addictive screen time.

 By doing what we do, analogue storytelling in front of warm bodies, we need to start with shorter stories, build up to longer ones, get the span of attention longer, larger, more resilient. The attention muscle has atrophied! It needs retraining. I believe we need to tell folks to read to their kids more often. Start with short stories, get into longer ones, combine stories. Heck, read them anything they will listen to. Discuss things with them. Get magazines like the Smithsonian or National Geographic and find articles to engage the kids, Mountain Bike Action magazine - anything! I think we need to be like that - try on multiple different fronts to engage young people, and retrain adults, quite possibly, based on a recent experience!

 As storytellers, I feel this year, we need to be far more "accepting", maybe tolerant, way more patient with young people. It's Not Their Fault. We will, in my experience thus far, need to take more deep breaths, show patience, and try to work to gather them into the stories we tell, like a blanket on a cold day. From what I have seen this might be tough, and also not needed everywhere. We do need to be the fireplace where young people can gaze and lose themselves to their imaginations (which are being stripped from them by technology). They need to learn (for the little ones) or relearn (for the older ones) that the imagination is a wonderful (and much needed) tool and place. We need parents to realize that reading to kids, telling them stories, is so, so important right now. The tv and devices need to be Put Away. A return to analogue. And when we face children, young people this summer at libraries and camps, etc., we need to give them space and be tolerant of their behaviour, and guide them back gently.

Karen Chace on a 12-week class she led this year (and has led in the past many times): “Was every student difficult? No, but the vast majority had trouble listening, attending to their work, many were even disruptive during the interactive games, and practice time outside of class was fairly non-existent.”

And I have also experienced some wonderful interactions with students. In fact, last week I did three presentations at a large school (5 – 6 year-olds, 7 – 8 year-olds, and the last group 9–10 year-olds). The smallest group I had had around 65 kids in it, the others much larger. With each group I set expectations. The first two groups were amazing – wonderful, we had a lot of fun. The 4th and 5th graders (9 - 10 year-olds) were challenged in their ability to concentrate or sit still, or even listen. At one point in a story Goldilocks ran into the bedroom, landed on a really hard bed and cried out: “Crud! That really hurt!” Some of the kids, I think mis-hearing my British voice, told me I couldn’t use that word. So I said, Goldilocks ran into the room, and landed on the really hard bed crying out: “Bother!” Again, the kids called out, “You can’t say that!” So, I did the same thing again and again substituting the ‘bad’ word until I was using words like ‘shoe,’ ‘saucepans,’ and ‘fish hook’ until we agreed on: ‘Oh, oops-ee-daisy!’ and moved on. This took up about four minutes of the story as the kids cried out and then settled down before starting over again. This I would expect from 2nd graders, not from too-cool-for-cucumbers 4th and 5th grade students. And it was fine. I tried other things in another story when one of the characters was granted a wish. I asked the kids (by raising their hands) what they might wish for. I used every trick in the book to engage on a more personal level and used some tricks that came to me, spur of the moment! They settled in, but it took time.

Like Karen, I had to have a serious talk with one of the kids (Karen had three and she eventually called the parents during her 12-week program). I rarely do this, and hate having to do this, but sometimes it is needed. Again, I don’t believe it’s the fault of the child.

 This brings me to another point! At another gig with very little, delightful pre-school kids with wonderful parents and staff, I had some issues. It was a special event and held outdoors. It was hot and sunny, and I was placed in a pavilion, and invited kids and parents into the shade with me throughout my set. Some of the kids later joined me, but it got a little wild. Some kids walked about the space, some came and sat next to my feet, and one little girl for a while stood between my feet and rested her elbows on my knees and rested her chin in her hands as I told a story. Engaging the other children, and the parents continued, and after the story some of the kids went back to their parents. Some kids were whispered to, others were not. Those who were not whispered to came back and goofed about a bit on the pavilion platform.

 When I finished and was packing up, a mother came over with her daughter. I thought we were going to have a nice little chat about stories, and by the look on the girl’s face, she though the same thing, but the mother then told her daughter to apologize to me for mis-behaving. This was a parent who had said nothing to their child during the performance, in fact I wasn’t sure if she was the mother until that moment. The look in the girl’s eyes changed and I thought she was going to cry. I felt pretty annoyed myself. The parent had done nothing to educate her daughter, and her girl was just being a little preschooler – being who she was supposed to be. I felt the parent was the one who should have been apologizing. I said pretty much, just that – the girl was being a little kid, that’s all. No harm done. And that kids need good role models, they need guidance as to how to behave, especially when it might be their first sort of experience like this. I gave lots of smiles to both of them and hope the point was made.

 Parents might need reminding that we, the performers, are not their children’s care providers. That care providers need to keep a check on their wee ones, that their wee ones might not know how to behave, but they, as parents, should be able to remember! I try to make light of a lot of this sort of thing and chalk it up to experience, and learn from it. We might have to tell parents that more than ever their children need active attention from them.

The kids have been through a lot, and I am sure many of these children have not escaped seeing or hearing about the horrific news about shootings. They are daily. Some are worse than others. There is so much division in the country, I am sure children feel that anxiety coming off parents and other adults around them. Kids sense a lot. We have to cut slack, as I said, breathe deeper, be more forgiving and supportive.

Again, from Karen Chace: “The principal was very aware of the problems and agreed the vast majority of students at the school were affected by the lack of social contact during the pandemic.” They are craving for contact, for attention. And it’s not all bad out there, as I said. We just need to be aware of the audience’s needs, and limitations. It is a changed world. As Fran Stallings wrote about her first time out in-person with children (K-2): “…they were great. Nobody moved, except with my gestures. Whew!! Teachers were dumbfounded. I credited the stories (with active participation tapping off excess energy). I’m glad we all survived together! Summer reading programs, with a wide range of ages and distractions, are a different challenge!”

And I Know we will rise to it. Milbre Burch again: “There’s a lot of work ahead, not all of it the kind you get paid for. Let’s all hold hands and jump!” Welcome to the new times ahead. Have fun out there and Love Your Audience.

Peace,

Simon

Odds Bodkin, Karen Pillsworth, and myself in the before time!

VSA Michigan soon to become ...?

Would you like to win $500?

Not everything I do is publicly posted.  My classroom work is a perfect example and, when it's through VSA Michigan. it's even more private as I work with students in special education classrooms or occasionally mainstreamed classes.  Their award-winning organization has been around since 1977 and I recommend them often.  Now I can't even know what name to tell people about this wonderful organization.  Their name is changing, but not their focus.

In 2019, after being an affiliate of the international network of the VSA and Accessibility Department of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC, VSA Michigan now faces a new and exciting challenge of being an independent non-profit organization-- and the need to change its current name. 

Whatever their name, my storytelling and theatre work with them is only one of the many arts disciplines they offer to classrooms and community programs for work with  children and adults with disabilities.  For example, I helped young adults with autism put together and perform a puppet show of Snow White and the Dwarves for their school district's early childhood programs.  They may have learned a bit about theatre, but I learned a bunch, too, from them.

Beyond that I worked as a storyteller in residence over a semester at two locations in Genesee County at five classes with students, culminating in a Show and Share.  Additionally Flint's Institute of Arts hosted Project Choice with several of us as teaching artists involving school groups from the Genesee ISD.  That county is part of 10 Affiliate and Partner organizations throughout the state with programs conducted annually reaching more than 25,000 individuals annually.  

When I mention their focus, it's upon ability, not disability, and upon creativity and achievement.  With some students non-verbal and possibly with severe movement impairments, it's been challenging as I worked for audience involvement.  When I say challenging, I'm still learning and seeking to learn even more because I want to bring stories that enrich the student's lives, or as VSA Michigan says:
•Every person deserves access to appropriate learning experiences in the arts.
•The arts promote understanding and communication for everyone.
•The arts are more than a product, they are a process – it’s the journey that counts.
•The arts in their many forms enhance a person’s humanity.

When I tell people about their work, I find myself recommending people get in touch with them to see about bringing their arts education to yet another community.  Their educational work is well known, but community arts and cultural organization also can benefit from their expertise in aiding accessibility.  I still will recommend them, but what will the name be?  

At the same time their training for teaching artists, educators, college students, and community arts education providers continues with their annual Community of Progress Workshop.  It runs from August 19 to 21.  (This is why I'm posting this earlier than my usual Saturday schedule.  It's last minute, but not too late to get involved.  If this sounds like you, too -- go to the organization's link at the beginning of this article).  I'm looking forward to its emphasis on learning strategies for teaching students on the autism spectrum and with  behavioral challenges. This isn't the first of these sessions I've attended and know it will give practical ideas to learn inclusive strategies to create a successful environment in the classroom and for teaching the arts to differentiated learners.  I closed out the past school year craving even more training and will travel to the Workshop knowing there will be tons to absorb.  I'm told it uses the principles of Universal Design for Learning while minimizing behavioral problems.  (Hmmm, sounds like that enhances all work or personal interaction.)  The workshop is up north at Higgins Lake near Roscommon and expect to be offline, so the second half of next week will mean playing "catch up."  

I expect next week's article will be a posting of Keeping the Public in Public Domain prepared this week.

UPDATE:

This is perfect as an update to the VSA Michigan (name soon to change) Conference I just attended. Also go to <https://autisticmama.com/signs-of-autism-in-adults/> which points out how we grew up at a time when this was misunderstood. It's a Spectrum with great variety. Even w/o having autism, there are overlaps to help people understand more.

Have you wondered if you might be autistic?
You've GOT to check out this post!