My Bookhouse : The Latch Key

Full of delightful fairy tales, charming poems, and engaging stories, the My Bookhouse series for children was published in the 1920s by Olive Beaupré Miller as a six-volume set. The books contained the best in children's literature, progressing through a carefully graded order, from the simplest poems and stories to those that are more complex. Miller set high standards for the books:

"First, -To be well equipped for life, to have ideas and the ability to express them, the child needs a broad background of familiarity with the best in literature.

"Second, -Stories and rhymes must be selected with care that the child may absorb no distorted view of life and its actual values, but may grow up to be mentally clear about values and emotionally impelled to seek what is truly desirable and worthwhile in human living.

"Third, -The stories and rhymes selected must be graded to the child's understanding at different periods of growth, graded as to vocabulary, as to subject matter and as to complexity of structure and plot."

The series would eventually include twelve volumes. The original volumes included:

Volume 1, In the Nursery (1920)

Volume 2, Up One Pair of Stairs (1920)

Volume 3, Through Fairy Halls (1920)

Volume 4, The Treasure Chest (1920)

Volume 5, From The Tower Window (1921)

Volume 6, The Latch Key (1921)

The series is an ideal teaching aid for parents who want to help their children read well, think clearly, and absorb the most important lessons that literature has to teach.

This volume, a facsimile of the original 1921 edition of The Latch Key, features information about how to get the most from the entire My Bookhouse series. It provides fascinating background information about the authors and stories themselves, as well as various indexes to the whole series so that parents and educators can find precisely the story or other information they need:

Ideals (by John Dryden)

Sketches from the Lives of the Authors (arranged alphabetically)

The Interesting History of Old Mother Goose

The Origin of the Folk Tales

What Is a Myth?

Epic Poetry and the World's Great Epics

How to Judge Stories for Children

Index to Authors, Titles and Principal Characters

Geographical Index

Historical Index

Special Subjects Index

Introduction to Index According to Ethical Theme

Index According to Ethical Theme

It also features the color illustrations included in the original edition of the book and is printed on acid-free, archival-quality paper for durability and long use.