As you reach out to touch the stone, you can feel its rough surface beneath your fingers. It’s like touching history itself, a connection to a world that vanished long ago. The inscriptions on the stone are like whispers from the past, voices you can’t quite understand. You and your fellow soldiers huddle around, gazing at the mysterious symbols with a mixture of awe and confusion. It’s as if you’ve stumbled upon a locked chest, and the key to unlocking it is right before your eyes. The air is filled with a sense of anticipation, a feeling that you are standing on the threshold of something extraordinary. Little do you know that this stone, the Rosetta Stone, will change the course of history and allow future generations to unlock the secrets of an ancient civilization.

Our story begins in the year 1799 when a group of French soldiers, led by a man named Napoleon Bonaparte, came to Egypt. They were not on vacation but on a mission to learn about the mysteries of this ancient land. During their journey, they stumbled upon a small town called Rosetta, and that’s where our adventure begins!

In Rosetta, the French soldiers found something extraordinary. They discovered a big, black stone with writing on it, and it was unlike any writing they had ever seen before. The stone was like a message from the past, but it was written in three different scripts: Greek, Egyptian hieroglyphs, and a cursive script called Demotic.

The soldiers were puzzled because they couldn’t read what the stone said. It was like trying to solve a riddle without knowing the answers. They knew the stone was important, but they had no idea how to unlock its secrets.

The stone was taken to a man named Pierre-François Bouchard, who was a French engineer. He realized that the stone might be the key to understanding ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, the writing system of the pharaohs, and the pyramids. He studied the stone and made copies of the inscriptions, hoping to find a way to decipher it.

Meanwhile, in a faraway land called England, a brilliant scientist and scholar named Thomas Young heard about this mysterious stone. He decided to take on the challenge of deciphering it. Dr. Young was like a detective who loved solving puzzles, and he was determined to crack the code of the Rosetta Stone.

Dr. Young worked hard and carefully examined the Greek script on the stone. He noticed that the Greek text mentioned the name of a king, Ptolemy. This was a clue that the other scripts might also be talking about the same thing.

With this insight, Dr. Young made a groundbreaking discovery. He realized that the Egyptian hieroglyphs and the Demotic script were not just decorative symbols but a form of writing. He figured out that some of the hieroglyphs represented the sounds of Egyptian words, while others stood for whole words or ideas. This was a huge step towards unlocking the mystery of the ancient Egyptian language.

But the puzzle wasn’t fully solved yet. The final piece of the puzzle came from an unexpected source. A French scholar named Jean-François Champollion, who was just a boy when the stone was discovered, grew up fascinated by ancient languages. He studied the work of Thomas Young and took it to the next level.

Champollion dedicated his life to learning ancient languages, especially Egyptian hieroglyphs. He traveled to Egypt to study the ancient texts and inscriptions on monuments. He was like a detective with a magnifying glass, looking for clues.

After many years of hard work, Champollion made an incredible breakthrough. He discovered that the hieroglyphs were not just for sounds and words, but they could also represent objects, ideas, and even names. He successfully deciphered the hieroglyphs, and with this amazing achievement, he unlocked the secrets of the Rosetta Stone.

Now, you might wonder, why is the Rosetta Stone so important. Well, let me explain it in simple terms.

The Rosetta Stone is like a magical key that opened the door to the past. It allowed us to understand the ancient Egyptian language and the stories written by the people who lived thousands of years ago. This discovery gave us a glimpse into the history, culture, and beliefs of the ancient Egyptians, who built the magnificent pyramids and created a rich civilization.

Thanks to the Rosetta Stone, we can read their writings and learn about their pharaohs, their gods, and their daily lives. It’s like a time machine that helps us travel back in history.

The Rosetta Stone is also important because it helped us understand the ancient world even better. By comparing the Greek text on the stone with the Egyptian hieroglyphs and Demotic script, we were able to unlock the meanings of other ancient Egyptian texts and inscriptions. This knowledge has allowed us to uncover more secrets of this ancient civilization.

In fact, without the Rosetta Stone, we might still be in the dark about many aspects of ancient Egypt. It’s like having the first page of a book that was missing for centuries. Thanks to the Rosetta Stone, we could finally read the whole story.

The Rosetta Stone is not just a piece of rock; it’s a priceless treasure that has enriched our understanding of history. Today, it is on display in the British Museum in London, where people from all over the world can see and admire it.

So, the next time you look at a book, remember that the Rosetta Stone is like the first page of a fascinating story about an incredible ancient civilization. It’s a reminder that we can solve even the most challenging puzzles with hard work and dedication. Just like the brave explorers and scholars who unraveled the secrets of the Rosetta Stone, we can all be like detectives, solving the mysteries of the past and the future. Who knows what other treasures are waiting to be discovered?

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This is the story of artist and archeologist Howard Carter, and his quest to discover the lost tomb of King Tut.

Howard Carter was born on May 9th, 1874 in Kensington, England. He was the youngest child to Samuel John Carter and Martha Joyce Carter. He had eleven older siblings! 

His father, Samuel, was an artist and illustrator who shared his drawing skills with Howard and the other children. With lots of practice, Howard proved to be a talented artist! One day he visited the huge mansion of a nearby family named the Amherst. As he toured the mansion, he walked into one of the halls to find a huge collection of Egyptian antiques. Antiques are objects from history. Howard was fascinated by the objects of this ancient civilization: statues, jewelry, and mummies. He wondered what it would be like to visit Egypt himself and learn more about this fascinating culture and civilization. Lady Amherst, who lived in the mansion and owned the antiques, noticed Howard’s interest. She also heard that he was an excellent artist. Lady Amherst asked Howard if he’d like to help draw antiques in Egypt. Of course, Howard was ecstatic and a few years later in 1891, when he was seventeen, Howard traveled to Egypt with a crew of archeologists. They were taking notes and making drawings of antiques from the Middle Kingdom at Beni Hasan. The team also explored Amenhotep’s city of Amarna, which we learned about in the last episode. Howard’s job was to draw the antiques and ancient ruins which could be studied by archeologists and Egyptian historians. An archeologist is someone who digs for and studies ancient people. Howard also sold some of his artwork to tourists. He lived in Egypt for seventeen years drawing artifacts! As you can imagine, he got very good and learned a lot about Egyptian culture. 

While in Egypt, Howard was fascinated by the pyramids and tombs. He hoped he’d find a tomb that hadn’t been looted by grave robbers yet. Sadly, most of them already had been. Even tourists were part of the grave robbing. They’d climb into tombs without permission and take objects and sometimes sell what they’d found including the mummies. Howard believed there had to be tombs that were still untouched by human hands and hoped he might find one. 

Howard and other archeologists knew there had been a king named Tutankhamen – but they didn’t know whether his tomb had been discovered yet. They had found small items, cups, a jar, a piece of cloth with his name on it, but that was all. An area of Egypt called The Valley of the Kings is where they believed he would have been buried, but most people thought that all of the tombs had been discovered there or been robbed. 

In 1917, Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon decided to search The Valley of the Kings for Tut’s tomb. Lord Carnarvon was wealthy and British and was interested in Egyptian archeology just like Howard. He also had money to hire people to do the digging that was required to find a tomb. They started digging all over in the sand in the Valley of the Kings. They did this for many years with no discovery. Lord Carnarvon was ready to give up, but Howard asked for just a few more months. Three days into the search they dug into something that looked like a step. They kept digging and uncovering the steps and the sand around them until they found more steps leading down into the earth. After much more digging, they found a doorway with … the words Tutankhamun printed above it! They had found the lost tomb of King Tut!

When Howard crawled inside the tomb, using a candle to light the way, he was surprised to find a small room full of all of King Tut’s artifacts that had been sent with him to his burial for his afterlife – a couch, a bed, a chariot, games, a throne, statues, and the glinting of light, the reflection from many gold objects. All of these antiques were more than 3,000 years old!

Howard and the team spent the next several months removing the items and taking note of them. They realized that grave robbers had found the tomb many years ago but someone must have stopped them because all of the items had been placed back in the tomb and sealed up.

Of all of the discoveries, the greatest was the burial chamber. Inside the room was a large golden box that took up almost all of the space. Inside it was a stone sarcophagus, three other shrines, three golden coffins, and finally the body of Pharoah Tutankhamun, the mummy of King Tut. 

The team found two more rooms, one full of treasures and an annex that was filled with 2,000 items. For the next 10 years, the team continued to remove and made note of all of the items, which helped them learn much about Egypt and the life of King Tut. 

One reason King Tut’s tomb has become so popular is that it was the most preserved tomb ever found. This means it looked much like it did 3,000 years ago and most of the items were safe and hadn’t been stolen or damaged. 

After the items were removed, many of them were moved to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Later, some of the most beautiful items, including King Tut’s golden mask were put on a tour around the world for millions of people to see. Visitors looked through the glass cases in awe at the gold antiques and the beautiful mask of the boy king. When the treasures toured the United States in the 1920s, popular songs were written about Tutankhamun, and President Herbert Hoover even named his dog “King Tut” after the world-famous pharaoh. 

Today Tutankhamun’s body and many gold treasures rest in the Great Egyptian Museum in Cario. Would you like to see them someday? I know, I would! If you’d like to learn more about King Tut be sure to look up some videos about his life and his discovery by Howard Carter. We also did an episode about pyramids you’ll also have to check it out.        

Thanks to Howard’s curiosity, we are now able to appreciate the treasures of King Tut. Think about the importance of being curious and persevering. Perseverance means sticking with something even when it’s tough. Think about what would have happened if they had given up instead of trying just a few more months. Think about how you can stick with hard things in your own life just like Howard!

The post Howard Carter and the Discovery of King Tut for Kids appeared first on Bedtime History: Podcast and Videos For Kids.

Our story begins in the ancient land of Egypt, one of the earliest civilizations in world history. Egypt was located in the deserts of Africa and its cities flourished around the longest river in the world, The Nile, which stretched 4,000 miles long. The Nile was used to give life to the farmlands and drinking water for the people who lived there. Egypt started as small bands of tribes who eventually farmed together and then were ruled by powerful leaders, who helped organize the workers and farm the Nile Delta. When the Nile flooded every year it made the farmland rich in soil where the people planted vegetables and wheat. They also fished and ate birds that lived in and around the beautiful Nile. The people also domesticated sheep, pigs, goats, and other animals. Domesticated means they created fenced-off areas and used them for milk and meat and other materials that helped keep the Egyptians alive.

The Nile River was also used as transportation to move supplies and people up and down the river. Clay from the river was used to build homes, and the river was also used to transport stones to construct the huge temples, pyramids, and other buildings that made up Egypt’s growing empire. Cities such as Memphis and Thebes became huge metropolises and were home to millions of people. Egypt traded its many goods with nearby empires and was ruled by a pharaoh, which was their name for a king. The pharaoh was also a religious priest and the Egyptians worshipped him as a “god,” who joined the other gods after their death. 

Tutankhamun was born in 1343 B.C. but no one is sure of the exact day. Most think that his father was the powerful Pharaoh Amenhotep and his mother was one of his wives, Nefertiti. Tutankhamun, or we’ll call him Tut for short, grew up in the city of Amarna. His father had moved the family from Thebes to Amarna, so this is where he spent his childhood. There, he learned the new religion of his father, who had changed Egypt’s religion from believing in many gods to making the sun God, Amun-Ra, the one and only god. All of the new temples were made in honor of Amun-Ra and all were commanded to worship the sun god alone.

Tut spent most of his time in a palace designed for the pharaoh and his family in Amarna. The palace was made of solid brick and white plaster and decorated with colorful paints. Within the palace walls, servants took care of Tut and his family, bathing him and his siblings, and serving them meat, vegetables, and other luxury foods such as figs, dates, and pomegranates. His hair was cut in the traditional style which meant it was shaved with a braid on the side. Guards surrounded the palace and servants were always waiting and at ready to do whatever Tut and the royal family asked of them. 

Tut likely learned to read and write when he was young like other educated members of the upper class and royal family. He used a reed to write on papyrus, which was their version of a paper made of reeds from the Nile River. The writing was done not using an alphabet but hieroglyphs which were pictures instead of letters, and there were around 1,000 thousand of them to learn. Learning all of them would have a lot of memorization!

For entertainment, Tut and his family took boat rides on the Nile, went swimming, or chariot rides into the desert. They hunted wild animals and likely played a popular Egyptian board game called Senet. He and others likely learned musical instruments which were later found in his tomb.

Tut’s father, Amenhotep died when Tutenkhamen was only 10, so he became king of Egypt at a very young age. At this age, he wore the signature crown of a pharaoh, a decorative beard, and held a crook and a flail which represented his power as ruler of Egypt. Even though Tut was the ruler by name, he was too young to take full control, so his father’s Chief Minister, called a vizier, and his top general helped run the empire. We don’t know all of the details, but because Amenhotep had made many radical changes to Egypt’s religion by worshipping only one god, some historians believe that the other rulers of Egypt, such as his Chief Minister, weren’t happy with those changes and wanted to go back to the old way of worshipping many gods. 

Some suspect there was a plot to end King Tut’s rule early, so they could change the religion back to the old ways. We’ll never know for sure what happened but it is very suspicious that Tut died in his teenage years. Were the Chief Minister and the General behind his early death? Truly, it’s become one of the great mysteries of world history.

After Tut’s death, his body was prepared for burial, which was mummification for the pharoahs of Egypt. If you want to learn more about mummification, it’s interesting but also probably not the best for bedtime! After mummification, he was placed in a coffin and a group of family members and servants followed the procession, like a parade, to The Nile River. The parade of servants carried food, furniture, toys, and all of the other items that would be buried in Tut’s tomb to the river as well. At The Nile, Tut, the family, servants, and all of the items were moved onto a boat and floated down the river to the grand pyramids. There, he would lay to rest with the long line of pharaohs like his father who came before him. Interestingly, most of the biggest pyramids had been built 1,000 years before King Tut. This shows just how old the empire was. Egypt was powerful for a very long time. King Tut’s tomb was sealed to keep out robbers. Many of the pyramids even had traps built into them to keep out grave robbers. Yes, when you see traps in adventure movies, they actually existed in the pyramids of Egypt. 

So what did the Egyptians believe about life after death for the pharaohs such as King Tut? They believed after death, King Tut would go on a journey through the underworld, the land of the dead. During Tut’s lifetime, he was taught many spells from The Book of the Dead which would help him find his way to a better place in the afterlife. Egyptians believed the afterlife was much like this life but even better if they completed the journey safely and used all of the correct spells. There they would continue to eat, drink, play, and hunt. But, if they wanted nice things in the afterlife the catch was they had to bring them along… Which usually meant the simple people didn’t have as much nice stuff as King Tut and the other pharaohs. They believed that by placing objects in their tomb such as furniture, bowls, cups, gold, jewelry, bows and arrows, chariots, and other tools, those objects would continue with them in the afterlife. That’s why when they found King Tut’s tomb it was loaded with all kinds of great stuff. His favorite toys, clothes, hunting tools, and other things he would want to take with him and make the afterlife very fun and comfortable. Food was even found in the tomb for him to snack on in the next life. Very interesting, right?

As you can imagine, finding this tomb with so many ancient treasures in it would be quite the find for a modern-day archeologist! We hope you enjoyed learning about Egypt and King Tut. In next week’s episode, we’re going to learn all about the archeologist Howard Carter and his quest to find King Tut’s Tomb!

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When Desmond was a little boy, Father Huddleston was walking through Desmond’s neighborhood. This was strange in itself. At the time, blacks in South Africa were required to live only in certain areas. So white men rarely came to Desmond’s neighborhood, unless they were policemen. Father Huddleston was clearly not a policeman: He was dressed strangely, with a stiff white collar and black shirt. Stranger still was what Father Huddleston did: he stopped, tipped his hat, and said a warm “hello” to Desmond’s mother. 

For a white man to treat his mother–a black woman–with kindness and respect was truly remarkable to Desmond, even as a small child. Many white people in South Africa either ignored blacks or were rude, or even cruel to them. Later, Desmond would learn that Father Huddleston worked tirelessly to help make South Africa more fair and kind to its black citizens. But that simple hello in the street showed him that all kinds of people were capable of compassion. All kinds and colors of people were human. And that planted the seed of the idea that he would spend his life striving to make it a reality. The idea of a South Africa where all people, black and white, lived together in a peaceful “rainbow” society.

When Desmond graduated high school after his bout with tuberculosis, he studied to become a teacher. He joined the debate club at his college, where he met Nelson Mandela, a young lawyer, who would become president of South Africa decades later. After graduating, Desmond got a job as a high school English teacher. He met a friend of his sister’s, Leah, who was also studying to be a teacher. The two began dating and decided to marry in 1955.  

But as Desmond was starting out in the world, the country was going through changes that would force him to take a different path than he had planned. South Africa was about to enter a very dark period of its history. Both Desmond and Nelson Mandela would play a big part in helping the country climb out of this period. 

South Africa had long had laws that tried to keep black and white citizens separate from each other. But in 1948, the country elected a government that wanted to be much more strict about making sure these laws were followed. They created a system of laws called Apartheid. They forced blacks to live in certain, limited areas. Blacks had to get special passes if they wanted to visit a white area. They couldn’t own land. They couldn’t vote. Blacks and whites couldn’t marry each other. They couldn’t even go to the same beaches.  

As Desmond and Leah started their life together, things were getting worse. The government passed a law that forced black South Africans to go to separate schools, and then didn’t pay black teachers as much as whites. Desmond and Leah decided to quit teaching. Desmond had been volunteering in their Anglican church and decided to become a priest. Meanwhile, Leah started school to become a nurse. 

Desmond studied to become a priest in South Africa and then in London. When he and his family moved back to South Africa in 1967, he began to speak out against Apartheid, cautiously at first. He wrote about how the church should help solve issues facing blacks in South Africa and beyond. When students at a university protested policies that supported Apartheid, Desmond gently stepped past the police dogs that surrounded the protesters and began to pray with them. Desmond would become known for this warmth and gentleness when facing tense situations.

Desmond was becoming a leader in the church as he spoke out more. He became a bishop, which is a very respected leader in the church. In 1978, he became the leader of the South African Council of Churches, which worked with many different Christian churches throughout South Africa. He was the first black man to hold this influential position. He used it to spread his message even further. He shared his vision of South Africa as a rainbow nation far and wide. 

Desmond was committed to working towards this rainbow society without violence, and even with gentleness and humor. He went to protest marches and committed civil disobedience, such as visiting beaches that were supposed to be whites-only. Civil disobedience is when you protest an unfair law by breaking that law, but in a peaceful way, which could still get you in trouble. And Desmond and other protesters DID get in trouble: Desmond was arrested and fined, and the authorities were violent with many others. 

Desmond also visited other countries, trying to get people around the world to care about the situation in South Africa. He met the Pope and the leader of the United Nations. He even asked leaders of other countries to boycott, or refuse to buy things, from South Africa. When he returned to the country after a speaking tour, the government took away his passport, which meant he couldn’t leave the country. They gave it back a year later, but this would happen a few more times as he traveled the world to speak out against Apartheid. Still, Desmond knew that if the leaders of other countries didn’t put pressure on South Africa’s government, it would be very hard to change things.  

Then, in 1984, Desmond won the Nobel Peace Prize. He gave a speech to accept the prize. In it, he told how Apartheid had caused people to mistrust and hate each other. He told how the police used violence against everyday people and peaceful protesters. He told how South Africa was a beautiful country of rolling mountains and sunshine, where people just wanted to live in peace with their families. He told how Apartheid had made that impossible for blacks and even many whites. 

Many people around the world learned from news coverage what Apartheid was really like for the first time. Governments finally decided to sanction South Africa, meaning they made laws that made it harder for South Africa to buy or sell things to other countries. 

Meanwhile, Desmond returned to South Africa, where he continued to speak and march against Apartheid. The government was starting to listen. Desmond and other activists met with the president of South Africa, Pieter Botha. But he still wasn’t willing to make many changes. 

But Desmond’s influence was growing. People loved to be around this warm, joyful man, who made everyone feel valuable and loved. In 1986, the church made Desmond archbishop of Cape Town. As the archbishop, he got to move into a big, beautiful house set aside for him. This angered the government because the house was in a whites-only area. But Desmond used his superpower and turned a tense situation into an opportunity to show kindness. He had a playground built on the lawn, and let anyone come to play or swim in his pool.

Finally, things began to change. In 1990, a new president was elected. F.W. de Klerk showed signs that he would be willing to end apartheid. He freed Nelson Mandela from prison after nearly thirty years and refused to punish peaceful protesters. After long talks with Mandela, Tutu, and others in the anti-apartheid movement, de Klerk agreed to put an end to Apartheid. 

In the next election, all South Africans were allowed to vote. Black South Africans, voting for the first time, lined up for hours to cast their ballot. Desmond dropped his vote into the ballot box in front of cheering supporters, then jumped up and down, saying he felt two inches taller than when he came in. He said a new South Africa began that day, “where all of us, black and white, will be holding hands and working for a common prosperity.”  Nelson Mandela was elected the first black president of South Africa. Today, South Africans commemorate this election every April 27th as Freedom Day. 

But the story didn’t end there. South African society still had a lot of work to do if all people were going to live in peace together. Think of a time when you had a big argument with a sister, brother, or friend. A time when you hurt each other’s feelings. It probably took some time to feel better and learn to be friends again. The whole country of South Africa felt this way. It would take time and work to help everyone feel like they could live and work peacefully together. Apartheid had been in place for more than 50 years. Many black people didn’t trust whites because of how badly they’d been treated. Many white people were afraid that the new government, led by a black man, might treat them just as badly in return. 

But Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu came up with a better plan. They formed a group, which Desmond led, called the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. They would help South Africans talk to each other. People who had been hurt by the old system would get to tell their stories. And so would people who had hurt others. They would be honest. They would listen to each other. Finally, they would be able to forgive each other.  

As Desmond put it, “I am human because you are human. My humanity is caught up in yours.” It’s important to remember when we’re angry with someone, they are still a person, just like us. We have to live with other people. Saying I’m sorry is one of the hardest things you ever have to do if you mean it. And waiting for someone to say they’re sorry to you is just as hard. But things start to get better right afterward. 

Sources

https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/truth_and_reconciliation

https://www.history.com/topics/africa/apartheid

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1984/tutu/biographical/

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1984/tutu/lecture/

https://passiontounderstand.blogspot.com/2010/04/this-day-in-history-27-april-1994.html

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/south-africas-tutu-anti-apartheid-hero-who-never-stopped-fighting-rainbow-nation-2021-12-26/

https://www.theweek.in/news/world/2022/01/01/10-memorable-quotes-by-desmond-tutu.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1994_South_African_general_election

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desmond_Tutu

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bantu_Education_Act,_1953

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F._W._de_Klerk

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pass_laws

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Mandela

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Early Days of Wangari Maathai

This is the world Wangari Maathai knew as a child. Born in the rainy season in the highlands of Kenya to a farming family, she spent a lot of time outdoors. She learned to observe the natural world: the rains, the rocks, the plants, and animals. She grew her own garden, diligently tending her crops. She fetched water from a spring where it bubbled up out of the ground and found hideaways behind forest plants. She learned how the rain fed her family’s crops, which fed her family and provided them with income when they sold the excess. She learned how that rain flowed down to rivers, providing clean drinking water for people and animals. 

She learned to respect nature because it could be dangerous. Animals hid in the forest – leopards and elephants. She learned to care for it because it could also be fragile. Human beings could easily throw things out of balance by taking more than they needed from them, or not protecting what they gave them.  

When she was eight, Wangari left her little farming village. Her mother took her and her older brothers to the nearby town of Nyeri so her brothers could go to school. In the 1940s, girls in Kenya rarely went to school. Wangari went along so that she could help her mother around the house with cooking and cleaning. But within weeks of their arrival, it became clear that this plan would never work. Wangari asked her older brothers about what they were learning each day when they got home from school. Soon, one of the brothers asked their mother why she couldn’t just go to school too.  Her mother decided this wasn’t a bad idea, and soon, Wangari was going off to school each day too.

Wangari loved school and did well. She especially loved learning about the living world, the plants, and the animals that had been her constant companions when she lived in her small farming village. She graduated high school in 1959 but didn’t want to stop. As unusual as it was for a girl to finish high school in Kenya at that time, it was almost unheard of for one to go on to college. But Wangari heard about a program that sent Kenyan students to the United States for college. She applied and got a scholarship! Wangari was off to study at Mount Saint Scholastica College in Kansas. 

Educational Adventures of Wangari Maathai

The 1960s were a time of big social changes in the United States. Women and African Americans were fighting for rights that they had been denied for a long time. They wanted equal opportunities to work and go to school, and they wanted unfair laws to be struck down. It was an exciting time, and Wangari embraced the ideals of equality and freedom. She went on to get a Master’s degree in biology at the University of Pittsburgh before returning to Kenya.

While she was gone, Kenya had gone through some big changes of its own. The country had been controlled by the British empire since the 1920s, but in 1963, it gained its independence. When Wangari returned, she came back to a country that was finally run by its own people. Wangari was excited to be a part of her country’s history. She hoped she could help it become a place where all people have equal rights and opportunities.

But, Wangari still wasn’t done learning. She began studying to become a veterinary doctor at the University of Nairobi. She became the first woman in East Africa to earn such an advanced degree! She began working as a professor at the university, teaching others about veterinary medicine. 

Working Towards Democracy

Even though she was busy working at her job and starting a family by this time, Wangari kept thinking about how she could help make her country reach the ideals of democracy and equality. She took time to notice the problems facing the people of Kenya. One thing she noticed was that the lush, green hillsides she had explored as a child, the forests that had first taught her about the natural world, had changed. So many trees had been cut down that the land looked bare. Under British rule, people had cut down huge swaths of forest to make way for crops that could be sold for lots of money overseas, like coffee and tea. For someone who loved nature, like Wangari, this was a sad thing, but she knew it wasn’t just a problem for the trees. This deforestation was a problem for people too. 

Trees help the land in many ways. They provide shade on hot days and grow fruit that people and animals eat. With their deep, spreading roots, they keep the soil on mountainsides from washing away in the rain. With so many trees gone, the rainy season no longer meant good crops and drinking water. Instead, the rain washed all the best soil down the hillsides, and into the rivers below. This made it harder to grow crops, so farmers couldn’t earn enough money to support themselves. It also made the rivers dirty, so the water wasn’t good to drink. With fewer trees, people had to walk farther to find firewood, which made it harder to cook meals.

These problems especially affected women, because they were the ones who went to fetch water and firewood. They had to walk further and further to find clean water and large trees. 

Wangari wanted to help return her country to the beautiful, green landscape she’d known as a child, and, at the same time, fix the problems that deforestation had caused. If she could help people plant trees, they would also be able to grow more crops, so they could earn enough money to live off of. They would be able to find clean water and firewood nearby. 

Wangari worked with a women’s group to pay women in rural areas of the country to plant trees. This helped with both deforestation and poverty since these women now earned a little bit of money to help their families. She taught women all over Kenya how to plant trees in nurseries, then transplant them into wild areas. At the same time, she taught them about how trees helped keep the land and their communities healthy. She called this project the Green Belt Movement because they planted trees in rows that would look like long, green belts across the land.

At first, the Kenyan government didn’t like Wangari’s movement. Didn’t like that a woman was taking charge, didn’t like that people planting trees weren’t professional foresters, and didn’t like that she helped poor people take control of their lives. Many in the government thought it would be better to make money for themselves by selling the deforested land to people who wanted to build on it. Wangari was attacked, beaten, and arrested.  But she never gave up. The Green Belt Movement planted millions of trees in Kenya. Hillsides became green again. Trees helped hold soil in place so it didn’t wash away into the rivers, making them mucky and brown. 

Wangari was even elected to Kenya’s parliament in 1997. She got 98% of the vote, which is very unusual for an election! Later, she was made minister of the environment. She helped make policies that would ensure long-lasting change and protection for the environment. Wangari felt that protecting the environment was a critical part of keeping people healthy and provided for. She had seen how the trees planted by the Green Belt Movement helped people out of poverty, cleaned up rivers, and made the soil healthy again. 

Over time, Wangari’s movement started to mean more than just trees. People started to see that it was about helping people who were suffering, and when you do that, you create a more peaceful society. When people have what they need, they can help others too. They also saw that the small act of tree-planting, when many people did it, had a huge impact. This is how democracy works too: when enough people vote or speak out, small acts can amount to big changes.  Kenya was working towards becoming a democracy during this time, so this was an important idea to spread. The trees planted by the Green Belt Movement became symbols, reminding people of how they could overcome their differences, make better decisions together as a country, and live in peace.

Nobel Peace Prize

In 2004, Wangari received a huge honor. She won the Nobel Prize for Peace. The Nobel Peace Prize recognizes someone who has done big things to support peace between countries or help people who were suffering. With her trees, Wangari had helped end suffering for people in Kenya and create a healthy environment where they could live peacefully for years to come. She did this even while she faced serious opposition from her own government. She worked not only to improve the natural environment but to guide her country towards democracy so that everyone could have a voice in how things were run. 

Wangari became ill and passed away in 2011, but the movement she started continues. They still plant trees in Kenya, but also partner with other groups around the world to plant trees and tackle other problems like climate change and inequality. Even though the world faces a lot of big problems, it’s important to remember that even small acts can lead to big change, if enough people do them. There are so many things you can do to help, too! Plant a tree, donate food to a food pantry, or just say a kind thing to someone.  If you do it, maybe someone else will too. All these little acts add up, bringing us closer, as Wangari put it, to “a time when we have shed our fear and give hope to each other.” 

Sources

https://www.climatestotravel.com/climate/kenya

http://www.greenbeltmovement.org/ 

https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2004/maathai/lecture/

https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1860/14.%20Kenya%20Country%20Profile.pdf

Crayton, Lisa A (2020). Wangari Maathai: Get to Know the Woman Who Planted Trees to Bring Change. Capstone, North Mankato, MN

Maathai, Wangari (2006) Unbowed. Random House, New York.

Swanson, Jennifer (2018) Environmental Activist Wangari Maathai. Lerner Publishing, Minneapolis.

The post History of Wangari Maathai for Kids appeared first on Bedtime History: Podcast and Videos For Kids.

Do you have a special toy that helps you go to sleep at night? Maybe a bear, or a rabbit, or a penguin? Lots of kids have stuffed animals that help them feel safe and cozy at night. 

The scientist Jane Goodall also had a special stuffed animal when she was a child. Her story starts back in 1930s London, and it was her father who gave her the special animal. Its name was Jubilee, and Jubilee was a chimpanzee. Her father didn’t know it at the time, but chimpanzees would turn out to be a very important part of Jane’s life. As a grown-up, she would become a primatologist, a person who studies apes and monkeys. She would become one of the first people to study chimpanzees in the wild, and one of the first women in the field of primatology. 

Jane was obsessed with all kinds of animals from a young age, not just chimpanzees. When she was a toddler, she brought worms into her bed because she was so curious about them. Instead of getting mad when she found her daughter carefully watching her wriggly new friends, Jane’s mother told her gently that the worms couldn’t survive inside, and needed to be outside in the dirt. I don’t know, but maybe this is what made her father think that she needed a special stuffed animal to sleep with!

Living in the city, Jane didn’t have a lot of opportunities to watch animals. That’s why it was so exciting when she got to visit a relative’s farm when she was four. At the farm, she was given the job of gathering eggs that the chickens had laid. Being a very curious child, Jane wanted to know how the hens laid their eggs. She watched them pecking around the yard, but they never laid eggs there. She watched them going into the henhouse, but couldn’t really see them laying there either, but it was hard to see inside. She asked the grown-ups in her family, but they wouldn’t tell her either. So Jane hatched a plan. She knew that the chickens laid their eggs on special nests in the henhouse, so she decided to go inside, watch quietly, and wait. 

So one morning, that’s what she did. She crawled into the henhouse, covered herself in hay, and sat in a dark corner. Then she waited. And waited. And waited. For hours. The grown-ups had no idea where she was, and became worried.  As the day wore on and Jane didn’t come home, they started looking for her, calling her name as they walked all around the fields and surrounding area. 

But still, Jane waited and watched. Finally, late in the afternoon, her patience paid off: She saw a hen lay an egg! She burst out of the henhouse, hay stuck to her clothes and hair, shouting to her parents about her discovery. Fortunately, Jane’s mother again saw things from her daughter’s perspective. She sat down with Jane and listened while she told her all about her discovery, how chickens lay eggs. Jane’s mother realized that she had a curious, determined, and patient daughter, and wanted to support and encourage her. 

Inspired by the book Tarzan and the Apes, Jane decided at age 10 that she wanted to go to Africa to study animals and write books about them. At the time, most grown-ups around her thought this was a crazy idea. World War II was raging in Europe, and Africa was known back then as a “dark continent” because not many Europeans had explored it and it wasn’t easy to travel there. People also thought back then that adventures like the one Jane was dreaming of were just for boys. But Jane’s mother was not most grown-ups. As always, she supported her daughter. She told her that it wouldn’t be easy, but if she worked hard and took any opportunity that came along, she could do whatever she set her mind to.

As a young woman, Jane continued to dream of going to Africa to study animals. Her opportunity finally arrived when she was 23, and a friend invited her to visit Kenya. She moved back to her parents’ home and worked very hard for a whole summer to earn enough money to make the journey. Finally, she made enough to buy a ticket on a boat and make the first part of her dream come true: she was on her way to Africa.

Once she was in Africa, Jane met the famous anthropologists Louis and Mary Leakey. Louis was impressed by Jane and hired her to work as his secretary in Tanzania, where he and his wife were doing their own research. After a few years, he sent Jane to the Gombe Preserve in Tanzania to study chimpanzees. The second part of Jane’s dream was coming true!

But it wasn’t as simple as packing her bags and heading into the forest. As one of the first women in primatology, the British managers of the preserve thought that Jane wouldn’t be safe as a young woman working in the wilderness. They insisted that she bring a chaperone, or someone to look after her, even though she was a grown-up who had lived by herself before. Jane’s mother stepped forward once again to support her daughter and went with her to Gombe as she started her research. 

The forest was a thick tangle of trees, plants, and vines, and there were dangerous animals to worry about. Jane’s tools when she went out to observe the animals were basic: a notebook, binoculars, and some food. But if the managers of Gombe Preserve were afraid for Jane, it didn’t make a difference to her. Instead of being afraid when she went into the forest for the first time, Jane has said that she felt like she was “coming home” to a place where she belonged. 

Jane’s way of working with chimpanzees was unconventional for the time. At this point, she still hadn’t gone to college or gotten a degree, so she didn’t know how researchers normally did things. She gave names to the animals she observed, like Greybeard, Goliath, and Flo, instead of numbers. She would watch them quietly for hours, so they got used to her, and would sometimes even approach her. This allowed Jane to get much closer than any other scientist had before. 

But even though she didn’t do things the way a primatologist was “supposed to,” Jane’s methods turned out to work very well! With patience and perseverance, she was able to observe many things about chimpanzee life that no one had ever noticed before. She got to know each animal as an individual and saw that each chimp had a unique personality, a lot like humans. She observed them hugging, kissing, and patting each other on the back. They seemed to have human-like emotions too–to feel sad, happy, and angry. They seemed to love and show affection for each other. 

She also saw them making tools, which was hard for other scientists at the time to believe. Many of them thought that only humans made tools. She had seen chimpanzees use pieces of grass or sticks to fish termites out of holes in their mounds. They would also use rocks to pound open fruit. Child chimpanzees even have toys–they use vines to play tug-of-war!

After Jane had spent a few years observing chimpanzees at Gombe, Louis Leakey arranged for her to attend Cambridge University to earn a doctoral degree. So she went back to England for a while but returned to Gombe to continue her work there afterward. She set up a research center at Gombe where scientists still study chimpanzees today. And, just like she decided she would when she was 10 years old, she wrote several books on her experiences with the apes.

Dr. Jane, as people often call her now, still works on behalf of chimpanzees. She spends her time traveling around the world meeting and talking to people about how to help protect nature and animals. She loves speaking with young people especially and carries a stuffed monkey (not a chimp!) with her wherever she goes. She believes that young people can be very powerful and change the world if grown-ups just listen to them.

Sometimes, a person can make a difference in unexpected ways, and small actions can add up to bigger changes. Dr. Jane used her patience and determination, quietly watching chimpanzees for hundreds of hours, to learn things that no one else ever suspected. Now, she uses that quiet patience and determination to inspire others to have hope and work to make the world a better place. I’ll leave you today with a quote from Dr. Jane herself: “Each and every one of us makes a difference each and every day, and we have a choice: What kind of difference are we going to make?”

I hope Dr. Jane’s story inspires you to think about the things you can do to make a difference for the better!

Sources

https://www.janegoodall.org.uk/chimpanzees/chimpanzee-central/15-chimpanzees/chimpanzee-central/19-toolmaking

https://wiki.janegoodall.org/wiki/Jane_FAQ%27s

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Goodall

The post The Jane Goodall Story for Kids appeared first on Bedtime History: Podcast and Videos For Kids.

Every morning Tegla wakes up very early and feeds her family’s animals, and then makes breakfast for her brothers and sisters and helps dress them for the day. As soon as she’s done with her chores she races out the door and out onto a dusty road.

Tegla goes to school like most children, but her school is 6 miles away, which is very, very far. She doesn’t have a car or a bus, so she has to go there on foot. But Tegla doesn’t just walk to school ….

She runs!

In her bare feet! But Tegla loves running. At first she didn’t love running to school. She only ran because she didn’t want to be late. But the more she ran the more she loved it. She could run the entire way without stopping once.

Tegla starts to run in races

As she got older Tegla wanted to run in a race. But others said, “you are too small, you are too weak. You should be taking care of your brothers and sisters, not running in races.” But Tegla didn’t listen to them. She started running races anyway.

She was so good that she won a pair of shoes, so she didn’t have to run barefoot anymore!

Most of the people in Tegla’s village didn’t believe she could be a great racer, but she kept practicing anyway. She was persistent. Persistence is when you keep doing something, even when it is difficult or others don’t believe you can.

When Tegla got older she had the chance to go to America, to the big city of New York to run in a marathon. A marathon is a race that is 42 miles long. That is very, very, very far! Before running the race others told her she was too small, that she wasn’t a good racer, that she should go back home. But Tegla said, “I will show you I am a good runner, I will win the race.” But no one believed such a small woman from a poor village in Africa could do such a big thing.

When the race began it didn’t seem like Tegla was doing very good. Many other runners were in front of her, it looked like she might lose.

But she kept running, breathing deep, pushing ahead like she did when she was little and running to school in Africa. Toward the end of the race, she began to run faster, and faster and faster. Soon she was passing everyone in front of her. The other racers didn’t know how she was going so fast. Before long she was in front of everyone else. No one believed it.

Everyone in the crowd started to cheer. Tegla dashed to the end. She had won the race! No woman from Africa had ever won the New York Marathon. Tegla had made history!

Tegla shows charity after winning

After winning the race Tegla was given thousands and thousands of dollars. She could have used the money to buy herself many nice things, she could have stayed in the nice city and never gone back to Africa. But Tegla remembered her little village, she remembered her family, and she remembered all the little boys and girls there who didn’t get to go to school and did hard chores all day. She used her money to start a school for kids who wanted to run and used it to help other kids from Africa have a better chance in life. Tegla was kind and had charity. Charity is thinking about others and doing kind things to help them out.

Like Tegla, you can be active by running or playing sports or dancing or doing gymnastics. This helps your body grow strong and healthy. It also makes your mind strong. You can also be persistent — to keep trying and trying even when something seems very hard. It might be a homework problem or a chore, but like Tegla if you keep at it you can finish it.

Like Tegla you can also be kind by using your time and other things you have to help others. Whenever someone else is in need you can remember Tegla and what she did to help make others happier.

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