Detroit Puppeteers Guild Sunday, May 31

This Sunday come to the Clarkston Independence District Library for a workshop on using Puppets for Storytelling with Pat Roan Judd showing puppets and mime, while I'll use a variety of puppets (including Ivan the Signing Tiger in the photo above). 

This is the great flier the library made

We still have spots open for our Puppet workshop this weekend! Sign up here: https://events.getlocalhop.com/detroit.../event/Dc1RqFPH1i/ -- if that link says it's full, come anyway. It's just a way of getting a rough number of attendees.

Puppeteers will actually start gathering about 2:30. Some information says 2 p.m., but that's part of the set-up time. After the workshop there will be a Guild meeting also open to the public.

Bailey - Stories from The Tale of Cuffy Bear - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

For those in southeastern Michigan, Sunday, April 26, is the National Day of Puppetry. Come to the Clarkston Independence District Library for a free workshop at 3:00 p.m. on "Puppets from Dollar Store Items" with Brad Lowe. Make a puppet and learn tips on using this inexpensive addition to storytimes.  The Detroit Puppeteers Guild will hold a brief meeting open to the public after the workshop.  Registration is at https://events.getlocalhop.com/detroit-puppeteers-guild/event/OXSPafBRTz/ .

Puppets are such a great addition to storytelling. I once had a campground that wanted stories about bears. Prowling some of the stories by Arthur Scott Bailey about Cuffy Bear easily turned up many adventures I shared with a puppet bear. Bailey wrote more than forty children's books. Cuffy was Bailey's first book with The Tale of Cuffy Bear and so popular he wound up writing four more about the mischievous bear, but I counted 42 other books about a wide variety of animals and insects. Plenty of facts and adventures can be found in his nature stories for whatever puppet you might have.

Because it's spring I'm going to give the second adventure Cuffy had. Telling it, I would omit the comments about the porcupine and Cuffy's injuries from it. The book I have is battered and obviously well-loved by its first owner. It includes on the cover  this illustration about the porcupine.

 

(The story said: Cuffy Gave It One Good, Hard Cuff.) 

III

CUFFY AND THE WONDERFUL SPRING

The pricks of the porcupine's quills made Cuffy Bear's paws so sore that it was several days before he could run about again. And during all that time Cuffy was a very good little bear. He did not cuff his sister Silkie once. You see, he knew it would hurt his sore paws if he did.

The days were still fine. Cuffy loved to feel the bright sunshine upon his black coat. It warmed him through and through and he did not care at all if his feet did get wet in the melting snow.

At last one afternoon when his paws were quite well again Cuffy strayed some distance down the side of Blue Mountain, He was alone, because Silkie was asleep. You know, she was younger than Cuffy and still had to take naps. Cuffy had slid and tumbled down the mountainside until he was further from home than he knew. It did seem good to be able to put his paws upon the ground again without whimpering with pain. And coming to a short, steep place, Cuffy felt so glad that he actually turned a somersault and landed in a heap at the foot of the bank. He sat there for a moment, brushing the soft snow out of his face, when a flash of light dazzled his eyes. It came from a tree right in front of him. And Cuffy at once jumped up and ran to see what it was. He found that some one had fastened a shiny, new tin bucket to the trunk of the tree.

Cuffy felt that he must have that bucket to play with. He knew that he could have heaps of fun rolling it about on the ground. And he was just going to knock it off the hook that held it when he noticed that a small spout had been driven into the tree just above the bucket. And as Cuffy stood there on his hind legs, reaching up as high as he could, he saw a tiny drop fall from the spout and go splash! into the bucket. Then, as he watched, another drop fell; and another and another and another. Cuffy wondered where they came from. It must be—he thought—that there was a spring inside that tree. Yes! he was sure of it, for the bucket was half full of water. He felt thirsty, for he had not had a drink since lunch-time. And so Cuffy stuck his head into the pail and took a good, big swallow.

The next instant he squealed with joy. It was the nicest water he had ever tasted in all his life, for it was quite sweet—just as if somebody had left a heap of honey in the bottom of the bucket. But when Cuffy licked the end of the spout with his little red tongue he found that that tasted sweet too. Yes! it certainly was a wonderful spring. Cuffy was very glad that he had found it. And he decided that he would drink all he could of the delicious, sweet water and leave the pail hanging there. Then he could come back the next day and there would be more of that wonderful water all ready and waiting for him to drink up.

---

IV

CUFFY LEARNS SOMETHING

After leaving the wonderful spring Cuffy Bear was so long getting home that he decided he would not say anything to his father and mother about what he had found. You see—he was afraid they would tell him not to go so far away from home again. But Cuffy had not been long in the snug little house before he had a terrible stomach-ache. He stood the pain as long as he could without saying anything. But he simply had to hang onto his little fat stomach with both his front paws. And at last he began to cry softly. Then Mrs. Bear asked him what he had been doing; and before Cuffy knew it he had told all about finding the delicious, sweet water.

"How much did you drink?" asked his mother.

"Oh—only a little," Cuffy answered faintly.

Then Mrs. Bear nodded her head three times. She was very wise—was Mrs. Bear. And she knew quite well that Cuffy had drunk a great deal too much of that nice-tasting water. So she made Cuffy lie down and gave him some peppermint leaves to chew. In a little while he began to feel so much better that before he knew it he had fallen asleep.

When Cuffy waked up he found that his father had come home. And soon Mr. Bear had Cuffy on one knee, and Silkie on the other, and he was telling them all about maple-sugar. For of course you knew all the time that what Cuffy had found was not a spring at all—but a sugar-maple tree, which Farmer Green had tapped so that he might gather the sap and boil it until it turned to maple-sugar. If Cuffy had gone further down the mountainside he would have found a great many other trees, each—like the one he discovered—with a tin bucket hanging on it to catch the sweet sap.

"So you see there are many things for little bears to learn," Mr. Bear said, when he had finished. "And the one big lesson you must learn is to keep away from men. Farmer Green visits those trees every day to gather the sap. So you must not go down there again."

A cold shiver went up and down Cuffy's back at these words. Farmer Green! Cuffy had heard a great deal about Farmer Green and he certainly did not want to meet him all alone and far from home. But as soon as the tickle of that shiver stopped, Cuffy forgot all about his fright.

"This maple-sugar—does it taste as good as the sweet sap?" he asked his father.

"Yes, my son—a hundred times better!" Mr. Bear replied. "I ate some once And I shall never forget it."

A hundred times better! After he had gone to bed that night the words kept ringing in Cuffy's ears. A hundred times better! A hundred times better!... A hundred—And now Cuffy was fast asleep and—I am sorry to say it—sucking one of his paws for all the world as if it was a piece of Farmer Green's maple-sugar.

****

In case you are considering more about Cuffy, Project Gutenberg gave the book this introduction:

"The Tale of Cuffy Bear" by Arthur Scott Bailey is a children's storybook written in the early 20th century. This charming tale follows the antics of a young bear named Cuffy as he explores the woods around Blue Mountain, encounters various animals, and learns valuable lessons about behavior and the world. With its engaging storytelling and whimsical adventures, the book captures the innocence and curiosity of childhood. The story begins with Cuffy waking up after a long winter's sleep and enjoying the arrival of spring. His adventures include finding a porcupine, discovering a sugar-maple tree, and learning to swim with the help of his father, Mr. Bear. Throughout the tale, Cuffy's mischief often leads him into trouble, such as trying to capture a pig from Farmer Green's farm and getting chased by hornets. These humorous escapades, mixed with moments of reflection and growth, reveal Cuffy's character development as he learns about friendship, family, and the dangers of the wild. All of these experiences culminate in heartwarming lessons for both Cuffy and the readers, making the book an enjoyable read for children and adults alike. 

With so many books by Bailey, Project Gutenberg provides a great service providing 44 of the books. For those extra four about Cuffy, go to Internet Archive.

************ 

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 20^th 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 them.

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.

See the sidebar for other Public Domain story resources I recommend on the page “Public Domain Story Resources."

 

Puppetry at the end of the month + looking ahead to Easter and Passover

Sometimes calendars just seem to get packed with so much to do! I'm posting about an event in the metro Detroit area coming up. Beyond this local event it's time to start thinking of stories and crafts for Easter and Passover.

 

If you are able, join us for a live, in-person Detroit Puppeteers Guild meeting at Clarkston Independence District  Library March 29th from 2:30 pm to 4 pm.

Learn about all kinds of Puppetry and watch Puppets as they perform puppet shows in the "Over the Rainbow" show by Herdsmen Puppets.

If you are a Puppeteer, Puppet builder, or just like Puppets and want to learn more, then this is the guild for you.

Share this event with your friends!

Then bring them to meet some of the puppet people that live in the Detroit area. 

 

Beyond that everybody is planning for Easter. There are already a lucky 13 Easter stories.

Here are some Easter crafts including All Natural Natural Easter Egg Dyes. 

At the same time this blog has a pair of Passover stories and suggestions for sources of even more beyond this.

Gruelle - A Change of Coats - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

It seems incredible, but I've actually seen leaves saying the change to autumn is near! John Barton Gruelle or Johnny Gruelle, is best known as the creator of Raggedy Ann and Andy, even though his career as a syndicated cartoonist and author/illustrator included much more. I mention this because his story of "A Change of Coats" came up when I went looking into the subject of change. It's in his 1919 book, Friendly Fairies. 

Of course it can be told as is -- although I'd  hope you would show his delightful gnomes afterwards. Another way I could see telling it is with the Crab and Lobster as stick puppets, a kettle (real or otherwise) with different colors of fabric. You might also talk a bit afterwards about Gruelle's famous Raggedy Ann and Andy.

A CHANGE OF COATS

Two mischievous little gnomes were walking along the beach one day and as they came to a pile of rocks they heard voices. One of the little gnomes put his finger to his lips for silence and peeped cautiously around the largest stone. There he saw a crab and a lobster sitting upon a bunch of sea-weed in the sunshine.

The other little gnome tip-toed up and joined his brother and when they had listened a while they winked at each other and quietly walked back to the beach. After whispering together a moment one of the little gnomes ran up the beach and over a sand dune.

The other gnome again crept up behind the large stone and listened to the lobster and the crab.

"Yes," said the crab, "I agree with you, Mr. Lobster! While our coats are just a plain green they are still quite beautiful!"

"Ah! You speak the truth, Friend Crab," the lobster replied, "Green is a lovely color and I am very glad that we are not purple!"

"I am very glad that we are green, too." the crab said, "Just suppose we were colored blue! I know I should not be able to stand it! Would you, Friend Lobster?'

"No indeed!" the lobster cried, "Nor would I care to change to any other color, would you, Friend Crab!" "It is nice to be satisfied! Isn't it, Friend Lobster?"

"Yes! Especially when we are as satisfied as we are!" The lobster answered.

The little gnome listening behind the large stone winked at himself and smiled. He knew the lobster and the crab would give anything if they were of a different color, for he could tell by their conversation they were dissatisfied with their green coats.

Soon the other little gnome appeared over the sand dunes carrying a large kettle, and when he got to a spot on the beach where the crab and the lobster could see and hear him he began shouting in a sing-song manner: "Old clothes changed to new! Old clothes changed to new! Old clothes changed to new!"

"Pooh!" said the lobster. "Who is foolish enough to wish to change their natural coats?"

"Hmm!" said the crab as he sidled towards the beach. "Let's go over and talk with him, anyway, and ask him if anyone ever changes the color of their clothes. Not that I wish to change my lovely green coat, you understand, but—"

"It would be interesting to hear about it, anyway!" the lobster replied, as he crawled after the crab.

The little gnome with the large kettle sat upon the beach and pretended he did not see the crab and lobster, but continued crying: "Old coats changed to new! Green ones changed to red! Old coat changed to new! Old coats changed to new!"

When the crab and the lobster came up quite near the little gnome pulled a number of pieces of colored cloth from his pocket and placed them upon the sand.

"How pretty!" said the crab.

"Very lovely!" said the lobster.

"Do you wish your coats changed in color?" asked the little gnome.

"Ah, no, thank you!" the two hypocrites said. "We were just looking around a bit!"

"Well, I am glad to have your company," said the little gnome as he took a piece of scarlet cloth and laid it over the lobster's back.

"How do you like that?" he asked of the crab.

"It looks fine!" said the crab. "Try it on me!"

The little gnome placed the scarlet piece of cloth over the crab's back.

"How do you like it?" he asked the lobster.

"Did I look that well in that color?" asked the lobster by way of reply.

"I think both of you will look far better if you let me change you to scarlet. It's in far better taste, too!" the little gnome added, pinching himself to keep from laughing.

"Shall we change?" the crab asked the lobster and the lobster asked the crab.

"You will find the color a great deal warmer," said the little gnome. "Green is decidedly cold, you know!"

So the little gnome gathered an armful of drift-wood and built a fire. Then he dipped the kettle into the sea and placed the crab and the lobster in the kettle of water and put the lid on.

"Be sure and make us a brilliant scarlet!" cried the lobster and the crab, as the little gnome placed the kettle over the fire. An hour later the two little gnomes lay upon their backs upon the sand and yawned contentedly, their little round stomachs almost bursting their belts. Near them was the upturned kettle, and scattered all about them on the sand were lovely pieces of scarlet lobster and crab shells.

"It's funny," one little gnome said drowsily, "how one sometimes will become dissatisfied with the way he was made by Mother Nature and try to improve upon her work! It usually leads to misfortune."

"Yes, that is true," the other little gnome replied, "We should be satisfied and contented just as we are!"

"Well, I for one am satisfied!" the little gnome said, stroking his fat stomach.

"So am I!" his brother laughed.

 ************************** 

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 20^th 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 them.

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.

See the sidebar for other Public Domain story resources I recommend on the page “Public Domain Story Resources."

 

Daren Dundee/Ken Samoray, My Puppetry Mentor

For a generation the children of Mount Clemens were blessed with the puppetry of Daren Dundee.  That was the stage name of Ken Samoray.  He came to the local library after retiring as a probation officer to begin his new career as a puppeteer and magician.

Every month during the school year he put on a puppet show, ending the season with "Stump the Puppeteer", encouraging the children to bring in something he might not be able to turn into a puppet.  The man's creativity was absolutely boundless!  The one that sticks in my memory is somebody in the days before cell phones brought a toy telephone.  He upended the receiver and turned it into "Alexander Graham Bull"!

He was also very active in the local Detroit Puppeteers Guild for a quarter of a century.  Through him I met "anybody who was anybody" in our local world of puppetry.  I, too, became an active Guild member.  His puppet shows really grabbed the kids . . . Try being in a darkened auditorium with a headache when flashes of light are ghosts all around flying all about the walls and ceiling!  The delighted screams of the young audience would either kill or cure your headache!  After a show he would generally come out and show a behind the scenes view of how everything was done.

As an eager puppetry student observing his work, I found I feel most at home with his work when it was not a play, but a puppet sidekick, including as a "walkabout.  Here on this blog I find I have 25 (one for each year of his performing!) articles on puppets . . .  how appropriate and with this article I will continue my involvement in it.

The sheer creativity of Daren/Ken went beyond even puppetry and magic as he entered and won many prizes for his art made from found objects.  He sent me a book wanting to share some of that work.  I'm going to let it speak for him.  Here are a few (there were more in the little album he sent me!):

I don't know what he called this, but I call it Ken's Samurai

His tee shirt says "In my defense, I was left unsupervised"

Some of his art awards

Ashley Bryan and Two Public Domain Sources

This will appear on the anniversary of the death of Ashley Bryan on February 4, 2022 at slightly over 98 1/2.  In his life he received many awards and even created this autobiography

Book photographs by Bill McGuinness with  Author Photo (jpg): Ashley Bryan

published by Simon and Schuster.  That link not only describes the book, but includes pages from it and links to YouTube videos of him showing his wonderful spirit.

His official Simon and Schuster author's page shows all 28 of his books they published, including the book where I first discovered him...The Dancing Granny.  I love Anansi stories and dancing and this book combined both elements in a storytelling style that made me want to dance while watching the trickster get what he deserved.  Each listing of Bryan's books also include another link to a curriculum guide.  Among those 28 books is his book, Ashley Bryan's Puppets showing his two-foot tall African-style hand puppets made with "beach junk" (a.k.a. found objects) plus "glue and thread and paint and a sprinkling of African folklore."

When specific stories were used, he gave their sources.  Today I'm going to post the original source of the title story from his The Ox of the Wonderful Horns and Other African Folktales.  I strongly recommend you compare this original from Kaffir Folk Tales with the way Ashley Bryan fleshes it out to make it even better.

An excellent anthology by Bryan is Ashley Bryan's African Tales, Uh-Huh which includes 14 tales from his Ox..., Lion and the Ostrich Chicks, and this story from In the Shadow of the Bush by Percy Amaury Talbot and retold in Bryan's Beat the Story Drum, Pum-Pum.

This summer I plan to tell stories of Friendship and that story will be one of many included in "Friendship Stew."  Next week I plan to say more about my Summer Reading Program on the Collaborative Summer Library Program theme of "All Together Now."

 

In the meantime I hope you read the many books by Ashley Bryan and also go to the Ashley Bryan Center website for even further information.  There were many tributes upon his death.  School Library Journal used this quote from NPR by Jason Reynolds, “But we throw ‘National Treasure’ around so cavalierly that when you get to know one, you realize how rare they are, and you want the world to dance jubilee in their honor. He deserved it. My god, Ashley, have you earned your rest.”

I believe Ashley Bryan's advice, "Wake up every morning and find the child in you" deserves to be his own parting words.

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

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 October 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

Linderman - How the Skunk Helped the Coyote - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

Driving this past week I found reason to sing "Dead Skunk in the Middle of the Road."  The chorus repeats the title three times ending with "Stinking to high heaven."  Skunks rely on their smelly defense and have no reason to think cars won't see them and leave them alone.  They leave their burrows now that the weather is warmer and trot around in the dark.  Whether you see them or not, you sure might smell them.

This sent me hunting skunk stories.  I found a good one that even includes coyote and wolf from Frank Bird Linderman.  I also found quite a few crafts related to skunks, including puppets to help tell the story.

I'll give more about that after the story which comes from Indian Old-Man Stories; More Sparks from War Eagle's Lodge Fire.  It's the sequel to Indian Why Stories: Sparks from War Eagle's Lodge-Fire found at Project Gutenberg.  The story opens with the War Eagle frame, but really begins with "Once, long ago."

Photo by Bryan Padron on Unsplash.com

https://www.vector4free.com/free-vectors/skunk

Nowadays Frank Linderman would be called an activist for Native Americans.  Besides political activism he wrote and collected their stories.  He wrote as much in a letter to a friend, "I feel it a duty to, in some way, preserve the old West, especially Montana, in printer's ink, and if I can only accomplish a small part of that, I shall die contented."  Besides biographies and other works he produced six collections of tales like today's story.  Most can be borrowed from the Internet Archive.  Just this year his Kootenai Why Stories became public domain.  I hate waiting six more years for Old Man Coyote (Crow) (1932).  It can be "borrowed" online at the Archive, but I must wait to post it here.

Beyond the stories there are some great skunk crafts. 

https://thetucsonpuppetlady.com/skunk-craft-activities/

The Tucson Puppet Lady has a free pattern for a felt skunk hand puppet and her site has other skunk activities as part of her blog.  She also has a large selection of free paper bag puppet patterns.  In addition she sells patterns for felt puppets, animal and people.  The people are "Muppet" style people which are excellent, although I would suggest substituting vinyl for the mouth as felt there wears out very quickly.  Like felt, vinyl doesn't have a problem with the edges needing the extra work of most fabrics.

Another excellent site, especially for Early Childhood needs, is Simplemomproject.com.  

The skunks are cute and would work for a paper bag puppet, stick puppet, or finger puppet (that one is mounted on a toilet paper roll.  Her Cut&Paste section is packed with a huge number of animals.  She also has ways to use crafts to help little children learn their letters.  As a preschool mom, she's right on target for others using crafts with young children.

That should help you tell the story, just avoid the real skunks.  My dogs over the years have been dowsed in both homemade and commercial de-skunk solutions.  While it may make them almost scent-free, the smell always returns in rainy weather until it finally either wears away or you become "nose blind."

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

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 October 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

Harper - The Gunniwolf - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

Normally I'd have posted a scary story every week in October.  This year I just didn't feel like it.  (I've noticed, ever since 9/11, a similar unpredictability in bookings for a time that used to be so guaranteed it was known among storytellers as "the storyteller's Christmas", providing the money to buy presents.)  

Today I want to give a humorous story that a generation of children in Mount Clemens grew up screaming over and laughing at the "Gooney Wolf," as one child called it.  I've never recorded it and if I did, it would only be with a live audience of children.  It is safest to use from Kindergarten on.  There are a very few Preschoolers unable to handle the tense threats of the Gunniwolf.  My Gunniwolf puppet stayed hidden in a large colorful roomy bag until he popped out.  He returned to the bag (with a bit of movements and grumbling while hidden) once the girl was out of the woods.  The song melody is unimportant as long as it's fairly monotonous.  (One storyteller I know uses the ABC song.)

While I never made a video of the story, there are some pictures from a workshop I gave.  If you want to see the other pictures, go to A to Z, Puppets are EASY!  The workshop included my telling the story as an  example of how puppets can be used to tell stories.  I considered inserting the pictures, but think you should get the story first.  The photos are at the end.

The Gunniwolf has caught me!

He's a lover of lullabies

(He's falling asleep)

Those great photos were taken by Kathy Calhoun at the program I did for the Birmingham Storytellers Guild.  THANKS, KATHY!!!  I'm awful when it comes to taking photos and so I'm immensely grateful to Kathy.

When the story ended and I talked with my young audiences, I pointed out how the little girl used her head to escape.  We also talked about if they would return to get the forgotten flowers.  Usually the response was "NO WAY!"  There were a few who advocated being prepared to attack the wolf.  That led into more talk about using your brains being better than violence.  It also is why I learned not to let the children near the puppet, in or out of the bag, afterwards as a few wanted to hit him.  Aside from the need to avoid violence, I hated replacing his styrofoam teeth!

The story first appeared in the 1918 book, Story-Hour Favorites; Selected for Library, School, and Home Use, compiled by Wilhelmina Harper.  It proves last week's comment about "when a teacher or a librarian or anyone else who does a lot of storytelling puts together an anthology of stories, they are more likely to be Ready-to-Tell."  After Harper's name we are told she was "Children's Librarian, Queensboro Public Library."  It was the first of her anthologies.  She died in 1973 and published throughout the first half of the 20th century.  She was an excellent example of those who created storytelling in libraries and schools in the early 20th century.  She also, unlike some publishing at the time, gave fairly thorough explanations of sources.  In the case of The Gunniwolf, she notes it is "Adapted from a Southern Nonsense Tale."  

I always thought the William Wiesner illustrations for the original picture book version missed the Gunniwolf's character.

That book is now out of print and considered a classic.  This review by Karen O'Hanlon, however, does an excellent appraisal of the value of this story.  

The good news is the book was again brought back for a time in print, so a copy is a bit easier to find.  The newer editions had all new illustrations, some of which capture both the Gunniwolf's menace and humor.  That's a neat trick and I think the children who have seen my wolf puppet will agree it's the secret to this story working.

***************** 

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 October 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!