The Object:
The Origin: Various sellers at the annual Printers Row Lit Fest from 2006 to present. I’m acquiring them slowly and currently have six.
The Backstory:
I grew up reading the capers of these five little mystery-solvers every summer when I’d visit my grandmother in Lake Junaluska, North Carolina. Grandmom had the complete collection of well-worn, creased hardbacks that had been read by several cousins before I discovered them. I’d grab one from the shelf by the kitchen, head out to the hammock in the yard, and dissolve into the pages.
The Hollister children solved crimes, mysteries, and riddles at home and on all of their assorted travels (camping, on a river boat, at a dude ranch, in Copenhagen). The books preached obedience to your parents and the value of teamwork (especially with your siblings). They are set in a simpler time – one devoid of drugs or stranger-danger. Eight year-old Helena couldn’t get enough.
I didn’t give the Hollisters much thought after about 1992. I’d moved on to more grown-up groups of friends (hello, Babysitters’ Club).
My first Summer in Chicago, re-discovered the Happy bunch at my favorite Summer festival – the Printers’ Row Lit Fest. While I still have many books to go before I have a complete series, I’m enjoying slowly re-acquiring them. It’s fun to dig through children’s literature to find the five beaming faces of the Hollister offspring. I only let myself get one a year.
The books represent a personal collection, but they aren’t precious. I hope someday to have kids in my life who wear out the spines a little more.
Update!: I just learned that these books were first purchased for my mother! I’m sure someone told me this at some point and it didn’t stick. I most-closely associate my mother’s childhood reading with Trixie Belden (though I suppose that would be the next-step series up from The Happy Hollisters).
Read the rest of the series here.