Stay true to you and don't be afraid to stand out: Maryellen's story
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Ideas aplenty
In The One and Only, Maryellen is sure all the plans and plots she dreams up can come true. From giving her house an eye-popping makeover to cutting her hair all on her own, Maryellen wants nothing more than to make an impact.
Maryellen Larkin liked to make up episodes of her favorite TV shows and imagine herself in them. This morning, for example, Maryellen was walking down the hot, sunny sidewalk with her dog, Scooter. Really, she was mailing a letter to her grandparents. But she was pretending that she was in an episode of the exciting Western The Lone Ranger. Her only companion was her trusty horse, Thunderbolt. (That was Scooter’s part.) Maryellen leaned forward as if she were battling her way through a blinding blizzard. If she didn’t deliver the medicine she was carrying, hundreds of people would die.
Maryellen never gave herself superpowers in any of her imagined shows. She didn’t fly or do magic. The difference was that in her TV shows, everyone listened to her great ideas. They followed her advice, and—ta-da!—everything turned out just right.
Maryellen put her letter in the mailbox, imagining that she was handing medicine to a kindly old doctor in a snowy town in the Old West.
“Thank you, Miss Larkin, ma’am,” the imaginary doctor said. “We desperately needed this medicine. You have saved hundreds of lives today.”
Maryellen smiled modestly and shrugged as if to say, “It was nothing.” Then she turned to go. “Come on, Thunderbolt,” she said to Scooter. “Our work is done.”
Scooter, a stout dachshund, had just flopped down and made himself comfortable in the shade of the mailbox. Maryellen whispered, “Come on, Scooter. Get up, old boy.” So Scooter rose with a good-natured sigh and waddled behind Maryellen, who pretended to trudge through drifts of snow while grateful townspeople called after her, “Thank you, Miss Larkin! You’re our hero!”
“Hey, Ellie,” said a real voice, calling her by her nickname. The voice belonged to her friend Davy Fenstermacher, who lived next door in a house that looked exactly like the Larkins’ house. Maryellen and Davy had been friends forever.
“Howdy, pardner,” Maryellen drawled.
“I’ll race you to the swing!” said Davy. “On your mark, get set, go!”
Maryellen and Davy ran to the Larkins’ backyard, with Scooter loping along behind them. Maryellen got to the swing first, jumped on, and began to pump. “I win!” she called down to Davy. “You be the Lone Ranger, stuck in quicksand, and I’ll jump down and rescue you.”
“Okay,” said Davy agreeably. Of course, they both knew that cowboys didn’t usually jump off swings. But the tree swing in Maryellen’s backyard was so much fun that they used it in lots of the TV shows they made up.
Maryellen swung high and then jumped off, landing on the grass with a soft thud. “Come on, Thunderbolt!” she called to Scooter. “We’ve got to save the Lone Ranger!”
Scooter, already asleep in the shade, snored.
“Better wake him up first, Ellie,” said Davy.
But before Maryellen could rouse Scooter, her six-year-old sister, Beverly, came clomping out of the house in an old pair of Mrs. Larkin’s high heels. Beverly wore one of Dad’s baseball caps turned inside out so that it looked like a crown. Right behind Beverly came Tom and Mikey, Maryellen’s younger brothers. They were four and not-quite-two years old.
“What are you doing?” Beverly asked.
“Nothing,” said Maryellen, wishing that Beverly and the boys would go back inside, but knowing that they wouldn’t. Maryellen, Beverly, Tom, and Mikey shared a bedroom, and even though the little kids were cute and sweet and goofy, they drove Maryellen crazy. Now that it was summer, Beverly, Tom, and Mikey stuck to her like glue. They couldn’t bear to be left out of anything fun that Maryellen might be doing.
Sure enough, Beverly said, “I want to play with you and Davy!”
“Me too!” said Tom.
“Me!” said Mikey.
Davy shot Maryellen a sympathetic look. He had years of experience dealing with Beverly, Tom, and Mikey.
Thinking quickly, Maryellen suggested to Davy, “What if the little kids are in the quicksand, too, and I rescue all of you?”
“Good idea,” said Davy.
“Pretend I’m a queen that you’re rescuing,” said Beverly.
“Oh, brother,” Maryellen muttered. That was another problem with Beverly. She liked to pretend, but she always pretended the same thing: that she was a queen. Dad called her Queen Beverly. “I don’t think they had queens in the Wild West,” Maryellen said. “I’ve never seen one on a TV show, anyway. Have you, Davy?”
“Nope,” said Davy firmly.
Maryellen smiled. Good old Davy always backed her up.
Queen Beverly looked stubborn. Maryellen was just about to give in to Her Majesty when their mother called out the back door, “Ellie, honey, come in for a minute. I need you.”
“Okay,” called Maryellen, feeling pleased. Mom needed her!
Maryellen’s pride wilted just a bit when Mom added, “Beverly, Tom, and Mikey, you come, too.” She wished Mom wouldn’t always lump her together with Beverly, Tom, and Mikey as if they were one big bumpy creature with four heads, eight arms, and eight legs. Mom certainly treated Maryellen’s older sisters, Joan and Carolyn, as separate, serious people.
I’m tired of being one of the “little kids,” grumped Maryellen to herself, for the millionth time. I guess I’m stuck with Beverly, but I’m much too grown-up to share a room with Tom and Mikey. Somehow, I have to convince Mom that I should share a bedroom with Joan and Carolyn so that she’ll think of me as one of the “big girls” and take me—and my ideas—more seriously.
“What do you need us for, Mom?” asked Maryellen.
“Just a quick family meeting,” said Mom.
“Oh,” said Maryellen without enthusiasm. She knew from experience that it was hard to get a word in edgewise during family meetings. They were not at all like one of her pretend TV shows where she was the hero and everyone hung on her every word. Maryellen sighed and said to Davy, “See you later, alligator.”
“In a while, crocodile,” said Davy. “I’ll wait here.”
Maryellen walked into the kitchen and slid onto the bench in the breakfast nook next to Joan, her eldest sister. Joan, who was seventeen and therefore nearly all grown-up, looked sideways at Maryellen’s grass-stained shorts and inched away, closer to Carolyn. It was crowded on the bench, but Maryellen wanted Mom to see her next to Joan and Carolyn, on their side of the table, so that Mom would think of the three of them as a group.
Maryellen could tell that this family meeting would be like all the others: frustrating. The kitchen was already noisy. Dad had left on a three-day business trip earlier that morning, but Mom and Carolyn, Maryellen’s next-oldest sister, were talking a mile a minute. Tom was wailing like a siren as he rode his toy fire truck around the kitchen. Mikey was banging a spoon on the tray connected to his high chair. Mrs. Larkin took Mikey’s spoon away from him and gave him a piece of toast, which was quieter to bang, and then said, “Kids!”
Everyone quieted down.
“I have an important announcement,” said Mrs. Larkin. “My friends Betty and Florence are coming to spend the night.”
“Who’re Fletty and Borence?” asked Beverly.
“Betty and Florence,” said Mrs. Larkin. “You kids have never met them. We worked together at the factory. They live in New York City now. We’re going to a reunion luncheon at the factory tomorrow.”
Maryellen knew that Mom was referring to the aircraft factory where she had worked during World War Two. Her mind sped ahead. Lots of TV quiz shows were filmed in New York City. Maybe Mom’s friends could get her a spot on one of them! She’d be the youngest contestant ever—
Joan interrupted Maryellen’s daydream with a practical question. “Where will Betty and Florence sleep?”
Maryellen’s mind sped ahead again. This could be the moment she had been waiting for! “I have an idea,” she announced.
But Mom didn’t hear Maryellen. No one did. Mom was saying, “I guess they’ll have to sleep on the sofa bed in the living room, though that doesn’t seem very welcoming.”
“I’ve got an idea,” Maryellen said again. She tugged on her mother’s sleeve. “Listen!”
But Mrs. Larkin just patted Maryellen’s hand and gave her a wink and a smile while everyone else kept talking as much and as loudly as ever.
Maryellen grabbed Mikey’s spoon and pounded it on the table the way she’d seen judges pound gavels in TV courtroom drama shows. “HEY!” she shouted. “Order in the court!”
Mom winced and held her hands over her ears. “Ellie, sweetie pie, settle down,” she scolded gently. “Please don’t shout and bang the table like Mikey. It’s childish.”
“Sorry, Mom,” said Maryellen, red in the face. The last thing she wanted was for Mom to think that she was childish. “But listen—I have a great idea!”
“Tell us,” said Mom. “You have our attention.”
“I think Mom’s guests should sleep in Joan and Carolyn’s room.”
“My room?” said Joan. “That’s impossible! Carolyn and I hardly fit in there together as it is.”
“We’re squooshed!” Carolyn agreed. She and Joan shared a set of bunk beds in a tiny bedroom.
“I have it all figured out,” said Maryellen. “Joan, you and Carolyn will give your room to Betty and Florence. You’ll sleep in the big bedroom with Beverly and me, in Tom and Mikey’s bunk beds, and the boys will sleep in Mom and Dad’s room.” Maryellen smiled at Tom. “You like sleeping on the floor, don’t you?”
“Yes!” said Tom. He looked happy. But then, Tom just about always looked happy. With spiky yellow hair sticking straight out all over his head, he looked like a cheerful dandelion.
Joan frowned. She started to say, “I don’t—”
But Mom interrupted, “Why, Maryellen Larkin! I do believe you’ve hit upon a solution to our problem.”
Maryellen beamed, although she wished that Mom hadn’t sounded quite so surprised that she had had a good idea. Flushed with her success, she rattled on eagerly. “After Betty and Florence leave,” she said, “Tom and Mikey can move into the little room, and the big room will be the All-Girls Room.” Maryellen was sure that sharing a room with Joan and Carolyn would change everything for her, and change the way everyone thought of her and treated her, too. They’d see that she was mature. After all, she was nearly ten. She was going to be in the fourth grade!
“But—but,” Joan sputtered, “that means four of us will share one closet and—”
“Whoa!” said Mrs. Larkin, holding up both hands. “Hold it, everyone.” She turned to Maryellen and said, “Ellie, dear, you’re getting carried away, as usual. We’ll give Betty and Florence the little room tonight. But let’s do one thing at a time, okay?”
“Sure, Mom,” said Maryellen.
“All right then,” said Mrs. Larkin. “Meeting adjourned.”
Mom lifted Mikey out of his high chair, and he toddled behind Beverly and Tom to go watch cartoons on TV. But as Maryellen, Carolyn, and Mom started to leave, Joan stopped them.
“Just for the record,” said Joan, “I’m not crazy about this whole room switcheroo.”
“Why not?” asked Maryellen.
“Well,” said Joan. “For starters, you’re sloppy.”
Maryellen could see that her sweaty hair and grimy hands were a sharp contrast to Joan’s crisp, clean appearance. “Well, maybe I’m a little messy right now,” she said honestly. She smoothed her rumpled T-shirt, which was a faded and stained hand-me-down from Carolyn. “I was playing outdoors.”
“I know,” said Joan. “You were goofing around with Davy like a wild tomboy, as usual. That’ll have to stop soon anyway, because you can’t be friends with a boy in fourth grade.”
Maryellen frowned. “Why not?”
“It just doesn’t work. You wait and see,” Joan went on. “But it’s not only your appearance that’s grubby. Your bed, your drawers, your closet—all your things are messy. Last night, you flooded the bathroom, and before that, you stepped in the popcorn bowl and overturned it. Face it, Ellie—you create a disaster area wherever you go.”
“Hey!” said Carolyn, sticking up for Maryellen. “Just because Ellie’s not persnickety like you doesn’t mean she’s a hopeless mess.”
“Right!” said Maryellen indignantly. “And I don’t create disasters. Do I, Mom?”
“Well,” said Mrs. Larkin, “I think what Joan means is that you’re not very tidy or organized, honey.”
“See?” said Joan. “I don’t think it’s fair that I should have to share a room with such a messy little kid.”
“A messy little kid?” Maryellen repeated, horrified. Granted, she was not a finicky fussbudget like Joan. But a messy little kid? One who was childish, wild, untidy, tomboyish, disorganized, and grubby? A messy little kid who created disasters wherever she went? Was that how Joan and—Maryellen gulped—Mom thought of her?
Ready to soar
When the action starts in Taking Off, Maryellen has already helped her two best friends overcome prejudice against a new girl. Together, they all put on a play to support a new polio vaccine—even though Maryellen ends up with stage fright. Only when she shows her creativity during a flying-machine contest does her voice finally shine through.
“In three weeks, I’ll be ten!” Maryellen Larkin exclaimed happily. Maryellen and her friends were walking home from school on a sunny April afternoon. Maryellen said, “I’ve been waiting to be ten my whole life.”
“Me, too,” said her friends Karen Stohlman, Karen King, and Angela Terlizzi.
“What kind of birthday party are you going to have, Ellie?” asked Karen King, getting down to serious business. “Bowling?”
“No, I did that last year,” said Maryellen. “This year I want to do something new—something that no one’s ever done before.”
“How about a Davy Crockett party?” suggested Karen Stohlman.
Davy Crockett was everyone’s favorite TV show. It was about an American hero, Davy Crockett, who lived in the mountains of Tennessee in the eighteen hundreds. All the kids had hats with long fur tails like the one Davy Crockett wore. Maryellen even had “Daisy Crockett” underwear!
“We could sing the TV show theme song,” said Karen Stohlman. She sang: “Davy, Davy Crockett, king of the wild frontier!”
“No,” said Angela. “We’ll sing, ‘Ellie, Ellie Larkin, queen of Daytona Beach!’ ”
This struck all four girls as hilarious. They laughed until Karen King asked, “Speaking of Davy, will you invite Davy Fenstermacher to your party this year? You have every other year.”
“That was back when we were friends,” said Maryellen.
Davy Fenstermacher lived next door to the Larkins. He and Maryellen used to be best friends. They’d ride their bikes to school together, eat lunch together, and play together after school and on weekends. But they’d had a falling-out back at the beginning of the school year, and their friendship still was not repaired. Davy never even spoke to Maryellen anymore.
“Davy wouldn’t come to my party if I asked him, now,” she said. “He’s too busy being best friends with Wayne.”
“Wayne the Pain,” said Karen Stohlman.
Maryellen said briskly, “Ten is too old to have boys at your birthday party anyway. You don’t have boys again until you’re teenagers in high school, and the boys are your boyfriends, and you play records and dance, sort of like a sock hop only at your house.”
All the girls knew that a sock hop was a dance where you took off your shoes and danced in your socks so that you wouldn’t scuff up the floor. They were trying to imagine even wanting to do such a thing as dance with a boy, especially one like Wayne, who, they felt certain, would only be more Wayne-ish and pain-ish in high school than he was now.
“Joan told me about high school parties,” Maryellen added. “That’s how I know.”
“Ah!” said the girls. They were in awe of Joan, Maryellen’s eldest sister. They respected Joan as their highest authority on fashion, romance, and being grown-up. After all, Joan was engaged to her boyfriend, Jerry, who had been a sailor in the Korean War and was now in college. Joan and Jerry were already planning their wedding, which was to take place at the end of the summer. Maryellen was thrilled, because she was going to be a bridesmaid.
Suddenly, she gasped. “I’ve just had a brainstorm. What if I have a movie-star birthday party and everyone comes dressed as her favorite movie star? I could be Debbie Reynolds and wear my bridesmaid dress.”
“A movie-star party!” said Karen Stohlman. “I love that idea!”
The girls started naming all the most glamorous movie stars of 1955.
“I’ll be Audrey Hepburn,” said Angela.
“Dibs on Grace Kelly,” said Karen Stohlman.
“I can’t decide if I want to be Elizabeth Taylor or Marilyn Monroe,” sighed Karen King. “Or maybe I’ll be a television star like Lucille Ball from I Love Lucy.”
“Maybe I’ll be J. Fred Muggs, the chimpanzee!” joked Maryellen. She loped along the sidewalk, swinging her arms as if she were the famous television chimp. “And Scooter could come as Rin Tin Tin or Lassie,” she added.
The girls giggled. Scooter was a very nice dog, but far too stout and lazy to be heroic like the dogs on television.
“Oh!” said Maryellen, bouncing on her toes, “now I’m even more excited about my birthday!”
“Me, too,” said Karen Stohlman. “I bet your bridesmaid dress is gorgeous.”
“W-e-l-l,” said Maryellen. “It will be, when it’s finished. Mom’s making it.”
“Oh,” said the girls.
Maryellen knew what they were thinking. They’d all had experiences with their mothers making dresses as part of do-it-yourself crazes. Her friends were too polite to say it, but Maryellen knew they were thinking that dresses made by mothers didn’t always turn out very well.
Angela was the first to think of something optimistic to say. “Since your mom is making it, your dress will fit you perfectly.”
“I hope so,” joked Maryellen. “Or instead of Debbie Reynolds, the movie star I’ll look like will be the scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz.”
***
“Ellie, honey,” sighed Mrs. Larkin. “Stand still.”
Maryellen held her breath. She was standing on a chair while Mom pinned the tissue-paper dress pattern onto her. Mom frowned in concentration, and even Maryellen’s energetic imagination had to strain to imagine how a dress would emerge from the tissue-paper pattern. Maryellen hadn’t told Mom yet that she was counting on wearing her dress to her movie-star birthday party in a few weeks. Adding the pressure of a deadline would put Mom right over the top with nervousness, she could tell.
Mrs. Larkin sighed again, sounding harassed. Joan, the bride-to-be, looked up from her book and said gently, “Mom? You don’t have to do this, you know. I’d be just as happy with ready-made bridesmaid dresses bought off the rack from O’Neal’s.”
“No, no, no,” said Mrs. Larkin. She sat back on her heels and dabbed her sweaty forehead with the back of her wrist. “No, I’m determined to make the dresses. Your dad and I were married during the Depression, and so I didn’t have any bridesmaids at my wedding, and I was married in a suit—a borrowed suit at that! I want to do for you everything that I missed out on, Joanie.”
“Jerry and I don’t need a big fuss,” said Joan. “Just a small wedding is fine with us.”
“Nonsense,” said Mrs. Larkin. “A girl’s wedding day is the most important day in her life! Your father and I want yours to be perfect in every detail: your cake, your flowers, your veil . . .”
Maryellen piped up, “Your hair, your shoes . . .”
“Jerry and I have talked about getting married outdoors, in a garden or a park,” said Joan. “So I’ll probably wear flats. We don’t want to be all stiff and uncomfortable.”
“But I was hoping Jerry would wear his dress whites Navy uniform!” said Mom.
“That’s so formal,” said Joan. “We want our wedding to be relaxed.”
“Joan!” said Mom. “Flats? A park? This is your wedding, not a wienie roast. Honestly, sometimes I think I’m more excited about your marriage than you are.” Mom took a pin and—jab!—used it to pin the paper pattern for the collar onto Maryellen’s shoulder.
Maryellen suspected that the collar was backward. But she stayed quiet while Joan said, “No, I’m excited about the marriage. I’m thrilled to be marrying Jerry. But to me, marriage is one thing and the wedding is another. The marriage is forever and the wedding is only one day. Jerry and I want our wedding to be beautiful, just not stuffy and fussy.”
“It’s not stuffy or fussy to do things correctly,” said Mom. “I am determined that you and Jerry will have a proper wedding. For heaven’s sake, you’re such a bookworm that if I left it up to you, you’d probably get married on the steps of the public library.”
“And carry books for a bouquet,” joked Maryellen.
“Well, I do love books almost as much as I love Jerry,” Joan said, smiling. “But I promise I won’t get married at the library.”
Maryellen laughed. She was glad to see Mom laugh as well—even though laughing distracted her so that she pinned the paper pattern for the sash on backward, too.
***
The next day at school, Maryellen’s fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Humphrey, wrote on the blackboard:
Today is Tuesday, April 12, 1955.
“Wayne Philpott,” said Mrs. Humphrey without turning around, “if you shoot that rubber band at Maryellen, you and I will be having lunch together the rest of the week.”
Davy snatched the rubber band away from Wayne and put it in his desk, and Maryellen crossed her eyes and stuck out her tongue at Wayne over her shoulder. Sometimes she was glad that Mrs. Humphrey seemed to have eyes in the back of her head!
“Boys and girls,” said Mrs. Humphrey, facing the class. “Today we’re going to go to a special assembly for the whole school in the auditorium. Line up, please.”
As Maryellen and her classmates filed into the auditorium, she saw the principal, Mr. Carey, up front fiddling with the dials and rabbit-ears antenna on the TV set to get a clear picture. It seemed to be a news program. When all the students were seated, Mr. Carey turned up the volume very loud. The screen was too little and too far away for Maryellen and the other students to see, but they could hear.
“Ten years ago today, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt died,” said the TV newscaster. “Roosevelt could not walk, because he had had polio, a terrible disease that has killed many people, especially children. Three years ago, in 1952, a polio epidemic affected over fifty thousand people in the United States, and killed nearly three thousand.
“But today, Dr. Jonas Salk, at the University of Pittsburgh, announced that he has found a safe and effective vaccine to prevent polio. The whole world is grateful to Dr. Salk, and to the more than one hundred million Americans who contributed money to research for polio prevention. And now, the task before us is to raise public awareness and to raise money to produce and distribute the vaccine.”
The TV newscaster went on, but no one heard the rest of the announcement, because the auditorium exploded with cheers. The students and teachers clapped and whistled. A way to prevent polio was very good news indeed.
Maryellen felt someone poke her in the back. It was Davy. He grinned and raised his eyebrows. Then he turned away without saying anything. But Maryellen knew that Davy’s grin was a silent, split-second celebration between the two of them. Davy was letting her know that he realized how the news about the polio vaccine meant even more to her than it did to most people, because when Maryellen was younger, she had had polio. She was all better now. Really, the only reminder was that one leg was a tiny bit weaker than the other, and her lungs were extra sensitive to cold.
But Maryellen remembered very well how much polio had hurt. Sometimes in her dreams she had polio again, and the heavy, dark, frightened feeling of being lost in pain and worry came back. With all her heart, she was glad that now, thanks to Dr. Salk, no one else would ever have to know that terrible feeling. And she was glad that even though Davy didn’t seem to want to be her friend anymore, he understood how she felt.
Guidance for girls today
Standing out, using imagination, teaming up—through her stories, Maryellen becomes a role model for girls confronted with their own obstacles and opportunities:
Being different. Even though her friends think it's strange, Maryellen builds a close connection with a new Italian girl who joins her class.
Celebrating creativity. Maryellen's inventive mind is always looking for fresh ways to be original, and she's never discouraged when her ideas don't go as planned.
Working together. When the boys in the Science Club don't want to listen to Maryellen, she enlists her friends—and their thoughts—into challenging for the top spot in a contest.
“Maryellen's stories come straight from my own memories and heart. Like her, I'm the middle child in a big, boisterous, Baby Boom family, so I know standing out takes effort. Maryellen's parents encourage her exactly as my parents encouraged me: Be yourself. Challenge assumptions. Use your energy and ability to make the world better.”
“Maryellen's stories come straight from my own memories and heart. Like her, I'm the middle child in a big, boisterous, Baby Boom family, so I know standing out takes effort. Maryellen's parents encourage her exactly as my parents encouraged me: Be yourself. Challenge assumptions. Use your energy and ability to make the world better.”
— Valerie Tripp, author of the Maryellen series
Authentic from the start
In America, the 1950s were a boom time, often viewed as a golden age of peace and prosperity. But it was also a time of conformity and materialism, with strong social pressures to be like everyone else.
To bring these big themes down to girl size, we sought the talents of Valerie Tripp, who proved to be a rich resource, full of ideas—just like Maryellen. Along with Valerie, our development team explored a broad range of topics to cover in Maryellen's stories: the space race, the Cold War, the stereotyping of women's roles, the lingering effects of polio, the joy of exploring America.
From that research, Maryellen and her world took shape, resulting in a character who, to quote her, "isn't what people expect. In fact, the best ideas"—and characters—"come when you're not trying to be like everyone else."
An iconic figure from the World War Two era, “Rosie the Riveter” served as a symbol of working women like Maryellen's mom who performed manufacturing jobs in place of the soldiers fighting overseas.
This image evokes 1950s advertising that glamorized domestic duties. Maryellen contrasts the sparkling, always-cheery moms she sees on TV who "vacuum in pearls and high heels" with her own frazzled mother tending to the needs of six busy children.
Putting it all into play
To make the jukebox experience authentic, we created six original songs based on iconic '50s sounds—you even have to push the right letter-number combination to hear the tunes, just like the real thing!
By the 1950s, form became as important as function, with basic appliances upgrading to more stylish and colorful designs like the Larkins' refrigerator.
The poodle skirt is an example of television's growing influence, as trends caught on much faster, making this outfit so popular that Maryellen and two of her classmates all wore the same skirt on the first day of fourth grade.
With the 1950s as a backdrop, our designers focused on the colors, fonts, and patterns popular at the time to make Maryellen’s diner true to life.
Scratching her name on a desk would mean no recess for Maryellen, but she could still do it on this one made with real wood!
Explore more of Maryellen’s world
AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!
Everything American Girl stands for! I like her story because girls can relate to it! Simple but powerful, Maryellen's story shares the importance of friendship and how one girl can make a difference. I very much recommend her!
American Girl Customer
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