Check Out This Free Digital Collection of 6,000 19th Century Children’s Books
The Florida University of Baldwin’s Children’s Historical Literature Library has a digital archive of 6,000 children’s books from the 19th and early 20th centuries that can be read online for free. The redditor discovered the treasure and shared it with the Reddit Books community . Fans of history and children’s literature will be delighted to browse pages with titles such as Aesop’s Fables , The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe and Grimm’s Tales – and share them with their children.
A note to parents looking for adorable storytelling books: most won’t be the fairy tales your kids are probably used to. One editor wrote that the first book they read in the archive was about a young girl who loved to pick flowers: “One day she went outside to pick flowers and got very sick. Then she died. Her last wish was to plant flowers. This is what her parents did. But her father also died. At least the flowers bloom every spring. Damn, the children’s fairy tales of 1850 were completely different. “
That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t read dark stories to your kids – you should! Some of the saddest stories can also be the most wonderful. But talk to them later. Let them also share what upsets or scares them. Tell them bad things happen, but they are not alone. And see how stories can connect us, even those that are 200 years old.