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Johnny Appleseed: The Legend and the Truth

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In three parallel strands, Yolen’s near-poetic prose relates the tall tale, the history, and the bare facts of the life of John Chapman, who even in his lifetime was better known as Johnny Appleseed. Simply and rigidly organized, each opening presents a full-bleed, double-page spread, a new verse to a continuing song, a dramatized portion of Chapman’s history, and a briefly stated fact. The five-line song stanzas each end with the refrain “Johnny, Johnny Appleseed,” and serve as the conduit for the traditional tale, albeit in a soft-focus, generalized style without any mention of the specific outlandish acts of derring-do that make the Johnny Appleseed stories so compelling to many. Grouped in a apple-bordered, ragged-edged cartouche with each verse is an entry titled “The History,” which together comprise the bulk of the text, telling the story of Chapman’s life in a narrative which is factual but embellished with unknowable details to round out the tale. Down in a corner of each opening is “The Fact,” which generally explicates a central point of verifiable information upon which the associated verse and history are based, sometimes including references to source documents, although in a few places they stray into the realm of opinion. Spread behind Yolen’s text are Burke’s paintings, which vary in style from realistic portraiture to simpler figure work, often alluding visually to early American folk art. Sometimes supporting the facts, but more often portraying some aspect of the tales, the art also evokes Chapman’s era by borrowing geometric motifs typical of contemporary needlecraft. Yolen ends with a consideration of how Chapman’s fellow pioneers perceived him and the way in which the great man became a great legend.
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