My America

In 1903, Maureen, originally from Ireland, comes to Boston to live with her old friend Sofia and her Italian American family, where the two girls share fifth grade class and various adventures.

Meg records in her diary the events from July to November of 1856, when her family is reunited and must face challenges from fires to pro-slavery border ruffians who are trying to take over Kansas Territory.

After her family immigrates to America from Italy in 1903, ten-year-old Sofia is quarantined at the Ellis Island Immigration Station, where she makes a good friend but endures nightmarish conditions. Includes historical notes.

Virginia records the events of her life as her family moves to New York City in the aftermath of the Civil War, and she begins to dream of a life in the theater.

In 1863, as the Civil War approaches her quiet town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, nine-year-old Virginia records in a journal the horrible things she witnesses before, during, and after the Battle of Gettysburg.