I dunno, I don't see historical novels disappearing at all, both adult and YA. And I am not sure there is one book to help kids learn to love history. So much of that love comes from innate curiousity about the world. If they are given nothing but names and dates, they'll turn it off. But if parents learn with them and read with them, there is much more of a chance to hook them

I know what I read as a kid that got me excited but they weren't necessarily historical fiction: books like Treasure Island, Heide, Three Musketers, Robin Hood that were just good books, but certainly told of a specific time and place. They were jumping off spots for learning more of history of that place. I don't know if that helps. I will also suggest that adults have been complaining about the younger generations lack of knowledge/work ethic/add your own since the first cave man threw up his hands in frustration at his children.

I agree with Cindy-actually, there is a current push in juvenile literature toward historical fiction as a rising genre. Well-written juvenile literature is not hard to find...I would argue that your statement Current fare substitutes a meanness, for adventure and challenge. is not completely accurate. We often remember the literature we read as young people fondly because we remember the enjoyment and the sense of discovery, but an adult re-reading can lead to disappointment. They most popular books weren't all classics then, either. Within the last decade there have been many well-written books for young people.
I could suggest specific titles if you would be more specific about ages and genders of the children.

For very young girls, a good place to start is with the American Girl dolls. Each one is from a specific era in American history and they come with appropriate outfits, books, and even DVDs.
My 8 year-old GD told me not long ago, "I need more history books and cook books." She reads everything she can get her hands on about history and even has read a book about D-Day.
I wonder why there couldn't be something similar to this for boys. Certainly, they wouldn't go for the dolls, but there must be something. There's an idea for a new and profitable business, it seems to me.

One that comes to mind for YA is Lois Lowry"s "Number the Stars", about families who hid and saved many Jews during WW II, based upon true events, of course.

Cindy, I blame my love affair with England on Robin Hood and King Arthur.

For 10-year-old girls, try Caddie Woodlawn.

The "Dear America" or "My America" series, too, are really good for the pre-teen set. I often read what my daughter would bring home, and the settings varied from standards like the Revolutionary War to Slavic immigration to anthracite coal mining in Pennsylvania, the migration of African-Americans from the southern states to the north in the mid twentieth century and a girl's stay at the Perkins school for the blind.

Why do you specifically want books written before 1960 (the ones I've mentioned were not) and are you looking for adult books or for the younger crowd?

I've started reading the Laura Ingalls Wilder books to my 5 year old twins. So far, we've read Little House in the Big Woods and are half-way through Little House on the Prairie. My daughers really enjoy them, and now refer to anything pre-1940 as "Laura and Mary's time"--LOL!

Another good kids book is Strawberry Girl by (I think) Lois Lenski. Unfortunately, when we tried it a year ago my daughters had a hard time sitting and listening to it. I may try it again in a year or two.

I'm having a harder time finding a chapter book my son will sit and listen too. He just turned 4, so maybe he's just not ready yet? He loves picture books, but has no patience for the longer books yet. Any suggestions for chapter books that a (very) young boy would enjoy??

Kelly

Johnny Tremain, The Bronze Bow, and the The Witch of Blackbird Pond were favorites of mine. But I was reading adult books by 12 too. Not racy, just written for adults.

Kelly-4 is a little young for the concentration of chapter books. They just don't have the life experiences needed to connect. I would suggest things like the Frog and Toad books, or the George and Martha books-classified by most libraries as easy-readers, and they do have "chapters" but the chapters are usually a page or two long, and each one is almost a self-contained story...with lots of illustrations. You don't have to read the whole thing-a chapter at a time, with a fun bookmark, is a very "big boy" thing to do!
Then I would look for a really cute series called the PeeWee Scouts.

Just as a bit of topical info: the Newbery, the Caldecott and the Coretta Scott King award-winning books this year are all juvenile historic fiction, as were several of the Honor Books.

The 2008 Newbery Medal winner is Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village by Laura Amy Schlitz

Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis, was an Honor Book of the Newbery medal and was the winner of the Coretta Scott King Book Award.

The 2008 Caldecott Medal winner is The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick. Unusually for the Caldecott, which is an award for illustrations, this book, set in 1931 Paris, is 500 pages.
two of the honor books are historic fiction: Henry's Freedom Box: A True Story from the Underground Railroad by illustrated by Kadir Nelson, written by Ellen Levine, and
The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain, written and illustrated by Peter Sís.

"Adam of the Road" by Eliz. Gray Vining won the Newbery Prize years ago. It's set in 13th century England and paints a vivid portrait of medieval life on the road.

There is also "Master Skylark", set in the England of Shakespeare's time. Also "Otto of the Silver Hand" by H. Pyle, set in medieval Germany. All three of these fed my interest in history, when I was young.

The Horatio Hornblower books would be good for teens.

froniga-they are much harder to find, I agree, but there are some series for boys as well...some of the "Dear America" feature boys as the protagonist; also, there is a very well-done and popular series called "The Baseball Card Adventure Books" that uses various famous baseball players of old, such as Honus Wagner, as the pivot of a story of time travel-I have had students then search out other information about the time period after reading the book.
My class of fifth-grader boys got into a "war stories" phase this fall and the librarian and I were kept busy trying to find titles to suggest that would be age appropriate and interesting. Civil War and WW II were the mot popular time periods. Several of them did read Number the Stars even though it is about a .....girl!

When I was in high school, our American history teacher required us to read one of Kenneth Roberts' books. His books should be interesting to most teenagers.

The Baseball Card Adventure Books! Wish I'd heard of them when my oldest son was young. He would have loved them. How long have they been around? Maybe it's not too late to get some of these for his 10-year-old son who "doesn't like to read."
Thanks for that mention.

Historical fiction is among the top favorite types of books by my 7th grade students. It seems, to me, to be more popular now than when I was their age. It came in right behind mystery and adventure and tied with fantasy. I often see the girls, at least, reading some sort of historical fiction novel and they always enjoy telling me what is happening in the books and about the time.

yes, they are still around and still being written by Dan Gutman:
1 - Honus & Me (1997)
2 - Jackie & Me (1999)
3 - Babe & Me (2000)
4 - Shoeless Joe & Me (2002)
5 - Mickey & Me (2003)
6 - Abner & Me (2005)
7 - Satch & Me (2006)
8 - Jim & Me (2008)

Thanks a million for that list. I will start with the Honus and Me and see if that convinces DGS that reading is fun. If he likes it, I'll get him the whole list. If DGS doesn't like it, DS will. He pined for a Honus Wagner card as a boy but, of course, that would have taken a very large miracle, not to mention a million bucks.

Cece --

You mentioned fifth grade kids on a "war stories" kick? How about R. Sidney Bowen's Dave Dawson series? They were published between 1941 and 1946 and they chronicled the adventures of an airman (American, if I remember correctly) in various theatres of World War II.

Of course, it's been decades since I've read those books but I remember them as being quite appropriate for a grade five reading level.

Thanks dyno-I'll see if they are available in the library!

Across Five Aprils is a beautiful book.

What started me on history when I was a kid was actually a dinosaur book I read when I was four. It said that Thomas Jefferson collected fossils at his home in Monticello. It was, I think, in the How and Why Wonder series. This is outdated, now. I also like "The Day the World Ended", which was about the volcanic eruption on Martinique in 1902. Books about major events can get kids going. I was asked by a child who had to write a report on Quito, Equador, what he could write about it that was interesting at all. I told him that Quito had two active volcanos outside of the city. He said "Two active volcanos?"!!! I showed hime the USGS website world volcano watch and he was learning about history in South America with respect to volcanic activity without stop until the library had him get off their computer. Science and discovery can activate a child's curiosity about history as well.

cacye makes a good point: I think history became something more than a tedious school subject for me after reading 'All About Archaeology' which was one of a science book series back in the 60's. It covered Egypt, Greece, etc as well as the Meso & South American cultures. I couldn't get enough of books about the Incas after that, bloodthirsty kid that I was. :) As for historical fiction that caught my interest, Johnny Tremain, already mentioned by bumblebeez, tops my list because it features so many historical figures that were just names in my history classes, but came alive in the fiction. For example, it's because of Johnny Tremain that I remember that Paul Revere was not the only man who took the message on the British army movement, and that the second was named William Dawes. Another historical fiction which impressed me was Margaret Irwin's Young Bess about Elizabeth I. Oddly enough, I saw the films made of both these books before reading the original novels; the films sent me to the library for the novels first and then to the history & biography sections. A third historical fiction which sent me to the history books was Georgette Heyer's The Spanish Bride -- when I read it now, I bypass the romance parts and pay more attention to the Peninsular War.