Both houses give you the opportunity to experience the real-life setting of a uniquely appealing fictional world. Both the Hart and Kenney homes have been restored and opened for tours by the Mankato-based Betsy-Tacy Society. Their parents, siblings, and friends all appear-under different names-in the books. There was a real Betsy (Lovelace, originally Hart) and a real Tacy (her friend Frances “Bick” Kenney). What not all Betsy-Tacy readers may realize is that Lovelace drew the Deep Valley stories from her own life in Mankato, a small city about 90 miles south of Minneapolis. Along the way are birthday parties, adventurous excursions up The Big Hill behind Betsy’s house and to the Opera House downtown, elementary and high school, and, eventually, Betsy’s efforts to find true love and begin a writing career. Starting with two small girls in the 1890s, the series follows Betsy and Tacy into young adulthood. For readers new to chapter books, the words and sentences are simple but interesting, and the books are long enough to give them a real sense of accomplishment without being intimidating.Real-Life Setting of a Most Popular Fictional Worldīlume is not alone: nearly 80 years after Lovelace published her first Betsy-Tacy book, the stories of the two devoted friends and their families remain among the most charming and evocative portraits of childhood in American literature. This series is a beloved classic for a reason, and fluent readers will want to both fly through the pages and savor the story. Despite being set in an earlier time, the girls' evolving world is relatable because of the universal emotions so open on the page: wanting to be popular, wanting to win a contest, missing a friend who has moved, and facing the internal struggles of growing up.
Given that the first book was published in 1940, some of the ideas and phrasing are dated (regarding gender roles, different cultures) but not offensive. There's surprising depth to the early simplicity when Tacy's baby sister dies, the girls talk about where she must be, and in later years, they like to sit on the fence and talk about God. Similar to the Little House on the Prairie books, the girls' early lives are filled with paper dolls, games packed with imagination rather than toys, and in later books, horseless carriages, travel, love, loss, and an appreciation that the world is a big, complicated place. Parents need to know that Maud Hart Lovelace's Betsy-Tacy series about three white girlfriends is a gentle walk through the idealized simplicity of life in the Midwest in the 1940s. They try hard to be good people, even while navigating adolescence and love, and there's an understanding that friendship is deeply treasured.
All the adults on Hill Street and their town, Deep Valley, are kind and patient, and play along with the games and charades the young trio creates.
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