Jumbo

Provides a portrait of Jumbo, a huge elephant purchased from the London Zoo by P.T. Barnum for his circus, who became a sensation in nineteenth-century America

Kindergarten-Grade 3-- This well-researched, beautifully illustrated picture book tells how the 19th-century elephant, Jumbo, `` . . . the largest animal in captivity . . . ,'' came to the U. S. as part of P. T. Barnum's circus. Carefully incorporating historical fact into her narrative, Blumberg captures the sense of wonder and ballyhoo that surrounded the world's most famous beast. The text also conveys a sense of the special relationship between Jumbo and his loyal keeper, Matthew Scott. An ``Author's Note'' provides additional background details. Full-color illustrations, including many double-page spreads, make this look at a unique social phenomenon an excellent choice for classroom read-alouds. --Barbara B. Murphy, Shaler Area School District Libraries, Pittsburgh
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

This fact-filled, well-researched nonfiction account of impresario P. T. Barnum's celebrated colossal elephant proves somewhat unsatisfying. Blumberg's ( Commodore Perry in the Land of the Shogun ) story takes the reader from Jumbo's humble beginnings as a tiny, neglected creature in a Paris zoo through his acquisition by London's Royal Zoological Gardens and his adoring relationship with keeper Matthew Scott to his purchase by Barnum for his Greatest Show on Earth. Although Blumberg's prose presents entertaining information about the pachyderm's size, care and celebrity, the book lacks an overall narrative arc, and ends rather arbitrarily. (Only in an afterword do we learn of Jumbo's dramatic death in the path of an oncoming freight train.) Ultimately, due to the welter of material here, the book reads like a well-written but slightly pedantic social-studies text. Hunt's ( The Mapmaker's Daughter ) outsized watercolors expressively capture both Jumbo's gargantuan scale and the Victorian world around him as the elephant is ogled by zoogoers and tended by his devoted keeper. Ages 5-10.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.