Teacher Jenna Bush Hager and former teacher Laura Bush take turns reading from their new book, “Read All About It.” - Michaela McNichol
Security at the Children’s pavilion was tight. A long line trailed back from a magnetometer to enter the pavilion to hear and see the first lady, Laura Bush, and her daughter Jenna Bush Hager discuss and read their new book, “Read All About It.”
“I’m so excited! I can’t wait to meet Mrs. Bush,” exclaimed a little girl, grass-hoppering around, tugging on her grandmother’s hand.
Once inside the pavilion, the excitement mounted. “Is that Mrs. Bush? Where will she come in? Is that Jenna? Is that Mrs. Bush? Is the first lady as important as the president?” the 9-year-old asked, while illustrating her own story, titled “The Little Girl Who Met the First Lady.”
At last the program began. The Librarian of Congress, James H. Billington, opened the 2008 National Book Festival, the eighth and last one that he and Laura Bush would produce together, and welcomed her as “the Reader-in-Chief.”
“It is a special honor to introduce to you this morning the woman who not only conceived of the National Book Festival, but who is here today as an author in her own right,” the Librarian said as the audience rose to applaud the first lady and her co-author.
The Bush women quickly slipped into familiar former roles, Mrs. Bush as a school librarian and teacher and Mrs. Hager as a teacher. They took charge of the pavilion classroom. They had their chairs rearranged so they could sit side by side, moved the podium out of the way, and solved a lapel-mike sound glitch by sharing a hand-held microphone.
Then they invited all the children to sit on the grass in front of them so they could see the pictures that “Junie B” series illustrator Denise Brunkus had created for “Read All About It.”
“We might be in trouble with security, but we’re sure they’re safe,” said Mrs. Hager.
“Jenna and I had a wonderful time writing this book,” began Mrs. Bush.
“We told stories to each other about the students we had taught,” said Mrs. Hager, adding that while they were growing up, she and her twin sister, Barbara, used to listen to the stories that their mother told after school about her students.
“There was a real Tyrone I taught,” said Mrs. Bush, who described the model for their character Tyrone Brown, the class clown, who thinks he rules the school.
“His older brother was in my fourth-grade class, and Tyrone would creep through the door and around the room in back of me and then scream and scare the children,” Mrs. Bush recalled.
“He scared her, too,” interjected Mrs. Hager with a laugh.
The next year, Mrs. Bush taught second grade, and who was in her class but Tyrone? “I had him for a whole year,” she said, describing his disruptive behavior until one day a story hooked him on books.
Then the two took turns reading their published story of Tyrone, whose world “turned inside out” when he discovered the other kids were so engrossed in a story about an astronaut that they weren’t watching him launch a missile from the reading rug.
“What is your favorite book?” one child asked during question time.
“I have a million favorite books,” Mrs. Bush replied, “especially those my children enjoyed, such as ‘Hop on Pop.’ When their father read it to them, they took it literally and jumped up and down on him.” The children giggled at the notion of kids jumping up and down on the president of the United States.
Mrs. Bush concluded the program by sharing with the children that she had decided to become a teacher in the second grade. “I just loved my second-grade teacher,” she said. “We became good friends and stayed good friends until she died. So go to school tomorrow and hug your teacher.”
During a pause in the book-signing line while a press photographer took pictures of the celebrities, the young writer finally had a chance to ask her question: “What was your favorite book in the fourth grade?”
“The Secret Garden,” responded Mrs. Bush.
The little girl who met the first lady was so focused on every detail of the first lady’s ensemble—”white earrings, a white necklace, a white silk pantsuit and white shoes”—that she forgot to jot the answer in her reporter’s notebook.
