Not Recommended: Gooney Bird and the Room Mother, by Lois Lowry

Gooney Bird Greene by Lois Lowry came out in 2002. In 2005, Gooney Bird and the Room Mother came out and there are a few more Gooney Bird books since then. Of course, Lowry has written many books -- several of which have won major book awards. 

Published by Houghton Mifflin in 2005, I'm disappointed that nobody involved in the creation of Gooney Bird and the Room Mother noted the problems I see. And, I'm disappointed in the starred review from Kirkus. Their reviewer described it as a "winning, tongue-in-cheek outing." School Library Journal said the illustrations highlight key moments in the story, but four of the 10 illustrations show kids stereotypically dressed up as Pilgrims and Indians. Why didn't they note that problem?

I didn't know about the Gooney Bird books until recently when a reader wrote to ask me about Gooney Bird and the Room Mother. Here's the description:

Gooney Bird Greene likes to be right smack in the middle of everything. That's why she wants to have the lead role of Squanto in her class Thanksgiving pageant. But that role will go to whoever finds someone to be the room mother. All the parents are so busy, no one can bring cupcakes to the play. Gooney Bird Greene to the rescue! She finds a room mother alright, but promises not to tell who it is until the day of the play. Now the kids are really busy getting ready for the show. But will the mystery room mother really show up?

Thanksgiving events in schools are disturbing because they introduce (or affirm) a feel-good story that glosses the truth of what happened. Reading reviews at Goodreads, I see two that note the problems I saw. Walton says that "History is totally whitewashed in appalling ways." Cindy says that she was uncomfortable with the dressing up part and that the book went from uncomfortable to "downright inappropriate" in its depiction of Squanto as a "very, very helpful guy." She notes that the book briefly references the fact that Squanto was forcibly taken to Spain and sold as a slave but that the general narrative of him is about choices he made to go here and there. Surely Houghton Mifflin could make sure their staff includes people like Walton and Cindy who could help the publishing house and the author, too, step away from feel-good stories that mis-educate children. 

Without hesitation, I am giving it a 'Not Recommended' label:

Several years ago I wrote an article for Journal of Language and Literacy Education. In it I analyzed Anne Rockwell's Thanksgiving Day and did a lot of historical research about Thanksgiving that I am using as I read through Lowry's book. Below, description is in plain text and my comments are in italics:

In chapter 2, Gooney Bird tells her teacher, Mrs. Pidgeon, that she wants to color Squanto's feather on the mural the class is working on. On page 10, we read that she's coloring one of his feathers blue. On page 13, she's coloring one red. 

Debbie's comments: Did the man commonly known as Squanto wear feathers? And if he did, what did they look like? Did he wear them all the time? Were some red and some blue? The man's name was Tisquantum, not Squanto. His correct name has been known for so long. Why do children's books continue to use Squanto? 

In chapter 4, the teacher tells them the mural is coming along well and that they also have to learn a song, make costumes, and select a cast of characters for the pageant. They need Pilgrims and Native Americans.  Gooney Bird wants to be Squanto. Children have begun working on their costumes, as shown by the illustration of them singing the song:

Debbie's comments: That illustration with kids in those hats and headbands appears four times in the book. I see that in many children's books and in many photos teachers share of their own classroom activities around the holiday. Lowry's book joins the pile of educationally bad children's books that get circulated in society. It miseducates every child who learns this is ok.

The pageant would be more educational if it was tribally specific. By that, I mean that instructional materials about the Pilgrims need to use the name of the tribal nation--Wampanoag--rather than generic labels like Native American. I'd also want to see more facts than are likely to be included in pageants. However, my guess is once the facts are included, any "fun" in a pageant disappears. If a fuller understanding leads teachers to reject books like this one, or to stop doing these activities, that's a huge plus for children they teach!

Here's the song lyrics, sung to the tune of Jingle Bells:

Succotash, succotash, lima beans and corn. Thank you, noble Squanto, you may set the platter down.

Debbie's comments: I think the idea is to show gratitude to Native peoples -- Tisquantum in particular -- for help in learning how to plant and grow vegetables but why is he characterized as noble? 

On page 32 the class works on their costumes. Their teacher tells them that the Pilgrims didn't decorate their clothing but Native Americans did. Students making headbands glue beads onto them and will also add a feather. Chelsea says "I wish I could be a Native American" because she hates her plain Pilgrim hat. There's a conversation about Pilgrims being brave, crossing the ocean. 

Debbie's comments: This pervasive activity -- Native people in feathered headbands and Pilgrims in hats with buckles is inaccurate. The idea that Pilgrims wore black and white clothing and buckles on their hats and shoes is not accurate. The Mayflower History page (and other sources, too), tell us that is a stereotype.  

Many people in the US wish they could be Native. They may have a romantic idea of what it means but that idea is often missing the difficulties Native people endured and endure as we fight for our rights, homelands, religious sites, return of artifacts and so on. There's a growing body of writing about people who go from wishing to claiming a Native identity. I've been compiling a log that you may want to visit. 

On page 34, Mrs. Pidgeon asks Gooney Bird if she has been working on Squanto's dance. On the piano she plays some low notes in a repetitive way and tells Gooney Bird to pretend it is a drumbeat that Squanto should keep time to, and maybe doing some "rhythmic foot-hopping, too." 

Debbie's comments: I can almost hear (in my imagination) the low notes Mrs. Pidgeon is playing. They're the sort of thing you hear in so many movies and TV shows and on sports fields where the team has a stereotypical mascot. It is kind of a BOOM boom boom boom, BOOM boom boom boom in a minor tone. If you listen to Native music done by Native drummers, do you hear that sort of thing? I don't. Take a few minutes to watch this video from the Museum of Indian Culture in New Mexico. In it, you will see how pueblo drums are made. There's a segment where a group of children is playing the drums they've made, and in the background of some of the narration, you can hear drumming. Music across Native Nations is different, of course, and I don't know all of it but I don't hear it in pow wow drumming or any other ceremonies of other nations that I've been to. I'll look for an example of Wampanoag drumming and add it when I find one.

In chapter 6 on page 36, Gooney Bird is wearing a hat with a feather in it. Mrs. Pidgeon asks why she doesn't have a headband. Here's their conversation:  

"I decided Squanto should have a better hat than the other Native Americans, because he's been to England, remember?"

"Well, yes, he did travel there. But that's a top hat, Gooney Bird. Something an ambassador might wear. I don't think---"

"I think Squanto brought it back from England. He probably went shopping and bought a lot of new clothes there. People always buy new clothes when they travel." 

Debbie's comments: Yikes! Granted, the character is a little girl but that character was created by an adult and looked over by editors at the publishing house... it is disappointing that nobody hit the pause button on the idea of Tisquantum shopping in England as if he is a modern day tourist!

On page 38, Gooney Bird began testing some dance steps and says that she thinks Squanto probably learned the tango in England. 

Debbie's comments: Again, how did this get by editors?! I'd have flagged the idea of a kidnapped individual learning the tango (as if he is a modern day tourist) as being ridiculous but I'd also have looked up the tango. When was it invented? The answer: in the 18th century. When was Tisquantum there? Centuries before that! 

Beyond that, it is important to know that Native dance is not performance or entertainment. Much of it is associated with a spiritual or religious ceremony. Teachers would not reenact something they see in a church or temple or place of worship... and it should not happen with Native dance either. Far too many writers misrepresent it in books they write. 

Near the end of chapter 8, Mrs. Pidgeon worries that the costumes and song are slapdash and ill-fitting. The students tell her all the things they've learned in her classroom and she cheers up and says:

"I'm sorry that I was depressed for a minute. It's just that the story of the first Thanksgiving is such a truly wonderful story, about becoming friends, and helping one another, and being thankful. I wish I could have presented it better, instead of writing a dumb song about succotash."

Debbie's comments: These pageants are not a wonderful story! Especially for Native children. Native parents have been asking teachers to reconsider them for decades.  

Gooney Bird has an idea. The day of the pageant, their presentation opens with Gooney Bird as Squanto, entering the multipurpose room with a dance that is "a combination of shuffles, taps, and twirls, with an occasional pause for a hop" done to Mrs. Pidgeon playing rhythmic drumming sort of music on the piano. At the front of the room, she says:

I am not the actual Squanto. The real Squanto was a Patuxet Indian who was born in a village near where the Pilgrims would land, but when he was born they hadn't landed yet.

He learned to speak English from some early settlers. He helped them in many ways. He was a very helpful guy. 

When some of them went back to England, they invited him to go along. His mother didn't want him to.

But he went anyway. This was way back in the 1600s. Squanto is dead now. I am not the real Squanto. I am an imitation.  

Debbie's comments: See notes above regarding Native dance and rhythmic drumming. Regarding Tisquantum speaking English: none of my sources say he learned it from early settlers. He learned it when he was kidnapped and taken to England. They didn't "invite" him to go along. Later in her remarks, Gooney Bird says he was taken captive, but why didn't Lowry or her editors remove the invitation part here? And where did that bit about what his mother wanted come from? I've never seen that before but I can imagine teachers raising that part and asking "would your mom want you to go so far away." It makes me deeply uncomfortable. He wasn't a child when taken. Does that passage invite children to think of him as a child? 

She asks the principal to tell the audience what imitation means (she said "I am not the real Squanto. I am an imitation.") and then continues:

He traveled around for a while, being helpful because he was a helpful guy. He was an interpreter between the Americans and the Indians. 

Debbie's comments: "He traveled around the world" and "being helpful" invoke an image that does not reflect the truth. I urge teachers to read Chris Newell's If You Lived During the Plimoth Thanksgiving. Get a classroom set of the book and use it to critique Gooney Bird's remarks! Develop a lesson plan on how to critically analyze the ways the Thanksgiving story is presented! In his book, Newell tells us that Tisquantum and 20 other Patuxet Wampanoag people and seven Nausets were kidnapped by Thomas Hunt who took them to Spain to sell them as enslaved people. 

She asks a classmate to explain the word interpreter and then continues:

But suddenly--a bad ship captain tricked him into going onto his ship. It was a big scam. They made him a captive and took him to Spain. The captives all were sold as slaves. It made Squanto pretty mad. 

But he was indefatigable.

After a long time Squanto finally made his way home. He had been away for years. And when he finally got home, he found that his village was gone. His people had all died. He was the last of his tribe. 

It was very sad. But he became friends with the great chief Massasoit, and after a while he met the Pilgrims, who had just arrived. So he had some new friends and they hung out together. 

The Pilgrims' lives in America would have been a fiasco if good Indians like Squanto had not helped them.

Squanto had gotten lots of new clothes in England, and he had learned to dance.

The End.

Gooney Bird bowed, twirled in a circle, did a bit of hula, and then said:

"All of my story was absolutely true, except maybe the part about learning to dance, but I think he probably did."   

Debbie's comments: "He traveled around the world" and "being helpful" invoke an image that does not reflect the truth. I urge teachers to read Chris Newell's If You Lived During the Plimoth Thanksgiving. Get a classroom set of the book and use it to critique Gooney Bird's remarks! Develop a lesson plan on how to critically analyze the ways the Thanksgiving story is presented! 

Gooney Bird tells children some truth but overall there is a silver-lining way to her remarks. "It was very sad" is immediately displaced by "But he became friends..." And then "... new friends" and "hung out together" and "new clothes" and "learned to dance" -- all of that softens the truth. And note the "good Indians" characterization, too. It implies there's bad Indians. Who were they, and what did they do that readers are meant to think of as "bad"? 

 

Notes about proposed Netflix show, Little House on the Prairie

Some time back I read that Netflix was going to do a reboot of Little House on the Prairie. I groaned. I'm going to use this page to keep track of what I see. 

April 10, 2025:

Most recently I saw this casting call: 

It tells us there's a character named Good Eagle. His mom is named White Sun. She is apparently a citizen of the Osage Nation. His dad is named Mitchell. Mitchell is white and Osage, and he's also a citizen of the Osage Nation. He went to the "Osage Mission" when he was a child. He loves books and speaks English. He built "the most impressive homestead" in a county in Kansas. He wants peace with the settlers. His wife, White Sun, is "more cynical about the white settlers" than her husband is. 

My thoughts: Do they have an Osage consultant working with them? Who chose "Good Eagle" and "White Sun" for those two characters? "Good Eagle" in particular strikes me as odd. Does it suggest there could be a family somewhere that would name their child "Bad Eagle"? Maybe I'm being unnecessarily snarky there, but that's what I feel towards the Little House everythings (books, merchandise, television show...).  As for Mitchell, I guess that's the name he got at the mission school and that's what he's going by now as a successful farmer. That's all from me, for now. 

 

Highly Recommended! A first look at Yáadilá!: Good Grief!, Written by Laurel Goodluck; illustrated by Jonathan Nelson

Yáadilá! Good Grief! 

Written by Laurel Goodluck (Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara)

Illustrated by Jonathan Nelson (Diné)

Published in 2025

Publisher: Heartdrum (HarperCollins)

Reviewer: Debbie Reese

Review Status: Highly Recommended

****

Back in 2016 I read a comic called The Wool of Jonesy -- and I loved it. Since then I've followed Jonathan Nelson's work. Again and again, his words and art are precisely what I want Native kids to have. Then in 2022, I read Laurel Goodluck's Forever Cousins. Her storytelling hits me like Jonathan's does. Her books are the ones I want all Native kids to have. He did the illustrations for Forever Cousins. If you've participated in webinars I do online, you know that I talk about their book a lot. And now, they're partnered up again in Yáadilá! Good Grief! 

Imagine me opening Yáadilá! Good Grief! Then imagine my smile as I see the sheep in the endpaper art! Something about Nelson's illustrations of sheep appeals to me in ways I can't explain. There aren't any on the cover (shown above) but sheep are a significant part of the story Goodluck and Nelson give to us. On the cover, you see a family (a grandmother, parents, and two children). 

Here's the synopsis:

Bahe and Dezba are helping their grandmother, Nali, move from her sheep camp home to their house. The family is packing up, carrying heavy boxes, and settling into a new life together, which isn’t always easy. At every frustration, they throw up their hands and exclaim, “Yaadila!” Good grief!

Bahe sees that this big change is hardest for Nali. But he has a secret plan. Whatever can he be doing with a bucket of water, all that yarn, and Dezba’s dollhouse?

In this heartwarming and quintessentially Navajo (Diné) story, author Laurel Goodluck (Mandan, Hidatsa, and Tsimshian) and illustrator Jonathan Nelson (Diné) together show a big change for an Elder made easier with a creative gesture of love and care.  

In my webinars, I tell participants to go right to the end matter in a book to study the author's notes. Those pages are packed with information that teachers, parents, librarians -- anyone who is going to use the book -- need to fully engage the story.

When you flip to the back of this book to find the Author's Note, the first thing you'll is a large red box with a note (white text on a red background) from the "Helpful Narrator" who says

Shhh. Don't tell Bahe, but I'm sneaking back. Wow, wasn't that a fun story? You learned how to yáadilá. You saw how a little sister could be annoying when you're busy doing something nice for your nali. And how cool was it to learn new Diné words? Now it's that time in a picture book when you learn about the author. The author--

In the midst of that sentence, we see an interruption in black text: "Excuse me? What are you doing here?" and then, the final sentence in the red box:

The author has a few words to share on her own. Yáadilá! I'm really done. Hágoónee'.

And beneath that red box/note from Helpful Narrator, we find the Author's Note. 

We first met Helpful Narrator in the opening pages. There, it tells us (the readers) how to say yáadilá and how to convey it, too, with body language. As soon as I get a hard copy of the book, I'll be back with some screen captures to show you how this all plays out. 

Helpful Narrator's purpose is to speak to us in ways that resonate with me. Within Native communities--and yours, too, perhaps--a reading or storytelling has moments when the reader/speaker steps out of the story to say something. It is a natural way of storytelling. In film, that's called "breaking the fourth wall" and it annoys some people, but I like it because it feels right to me. Storytelling is not strictly a performance! Storytellers might perform but they also engage their audience. That's what Helpful Narrator does in the opening pages, and at the end, too. 

I'll be back with more to say about this wonderful book. Obviously I am delighted with it which means I'm highly recommending that you get it for your public and school libraries, and for your classrooms, and your home library, too!

Debbie--have you seen THE ROUGH-FACE GIRL?

A reader asked if I have done or know of a critical analysis of The Rough-Face Girl by Rafe Martin. Illustrated by David Shannon, the book came out in 1992. I have not done a critical analysis and wasn't able to find one to share with the reader. This post, then, is the start of my analysis. Here's the book description:

From Algonquin Indian folklore comes a powerful, haunting rendition of Cinderella. 

In a village by the shores of Lake Ontario lived an invisible being. All the young women wanted to marry him because he was rich, powerful, and supposedly very handsome. But to marry the invisible being the women had to prove to his sister that they had seen him. And none had been able to get past the sister's stern, all-knowing gaze.

Then came the Rough-Face girl, scarred from working by the fire. Could she succeed where her beautiful, cruel sisters had failed?

And, here's the author's note:

To see good rewarded and evil punished, or justice, is rare. Stories, however, pass on the realities not of the everyday world but of the human heart. One way in which the universal yearning for justice has been kept alive is by the many tales of Cinderella. Indeed, some 1,500 or so version of the basic Cinderella story-type have been recorded so far. In each, the cruel and thoughtless at last get their just reward, as do those who are kind and good. 

The Rough-Face Girl, an Algonquin Indian Cinderella is, in its original form, actually part of a longer and more complex traditional story. Brief as it is, however, The Rough-Face Girl remains one of the most magical, mysterious, and beautiful of all Cinderellas. Grown on native soil, its mystery is rooted in our own place. I am happy to pass it on to children and parents today.

In my analyses of books labeled as folktales, myths, or legends, one question I ask is about the source for the story being told. So, what is Rafe Martin's source? His note refers to an "original form" of the story, and it also refers to a "longer and more complex traditional story."  He doesn't name his source. 

Back in 1993, Betsy Hearne published an article called "Cite the Source" in School Library Journal. It it is her Source Note Countdown, which she created to help people review or analyze a book like Martin's. (Write to me if you want a copy.) It came out a year after his book did, so perhaps it is unfair to apply her countdown to his book. It could apply, however, to subsequent printings of it. On her countdown, we would say his note is #5, "The nonexistent source note." She wrote:

The worst case is easy to describe. The subtitle or jacket copy of a book makes a vague claim to be a "Korean folktale," for instance-which is faithfully picked up and authoritatively echoed in the Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication (CIP) statement, there to remain forever engrained as fact. The source of this tale is Korea. It's a little abstract, isn't it? But, it's the closest we'll ever get to context, thanks to sloppy thinking on the subject of persons who may have exerted the most meticulous effort on text, art, publication, and distribution."

Poking around online, I may have found the source Martin used. "The Invisible One (Micmac)" is in The Algonquin Legends of New England or Myths and Folk Lore of the Micmac, Passamaquoddy, and Penobscot Tribes by Charles G. Leland, published in 1884 by Houghton, Mifflin and Company. In the preface, Leland writes that Reverend Silas T. Rand, of Hantsport, Nova Scotia, lent him a "collection of eighty-five Micmac tales". I found a copy of Rand's book, titled Legends of the Micmacs published in 1894 by Longmans, Green, and Co. 

I think Rafe Martin primarily used Leland. His version and Leland's end at the same place, but Rand's is much longer. I think Leland chose to ignore the second half of the story Rand gave him because it did not fit with his idea that this is a Cinderella variant. In the Rand version, half the story is similar to the one we see in Rafe Martin's book, but the other half is a different story entirely. It doesn't end with the happily ever after married couple. 

What I share in these next sentences is much-condensed. In Rand's version, the married couple have a son. He's a little boy who has a maul (hammer). When left unattended, he smashes a bunch of things, including a moose leg that is in the wigwam. The husband (invisible one) is out hunting, and when his sister (seems like she lives with them and has told the wife they must take care of the moose leg) sees what the little boy has done, the three (Rough Face girl, invisible one's sister, and the son) set off to find the husband. They find him sitting beside a load of moose meat. His leg is broken. He tells the rough face girl to take their child and go live with her father because he can no longer support her. She leaves. He tells his sister to go get an ax and kill him because he will never be the same again. She does. See how different the complete story is? There's more. You can read it yourself if you wish. My point is that the original story -- from Rand -- is much more than what ends up being given to young readers as a Cinderella story. I think it points to the problems in trying to center European stories and bend stories told by people who are not European into ones that look like, in this case, Cinderella stories. And of course, we can ask questions about Rand's source. At the very end of his, he writes that it was "Related by Susan Barss, and written down from her mouth in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, in the winter of 1848, and translated from the original, May, 1869, by S. T. Rand. Who was she?!

Below is a table of notes I am working on, doing my best to compare the three versions. The fourth column is for my comments. At some point I will do more with these notes. For now, I share them with anyone interested in Martin's story and I welcome your comments about the notes below or what I've said above. If something doesn't make sense, let me know! And as always, I appreciate your feedback on typos. 

MARTIN The Rough-Face Girl, published in 1992	LELAND “The Invisible One (Micmac)” in The Algonquin Legends of New England or Myths and Folk Lore of the Micmac, Passamaquody and Penobscot Tribes, published in 1884, available here.	RAND “The Invisible Boy” in Legends of the Micmacs, published in 1894, available here.	Debbie’s notes and comments
Once, long ago, there was a village by the shores of Lake Ontario.	There was once a large Indian village situated on the border of a lake.	Nameskeet’ oodun Kaspemku (a large Indian village, was once situated on the borders of a lake).
Off from the other wigwams of this village stood one great huge wigwam.	At the end of the place was a lodge…	At the extreme end of the village…
Painted on its sides were pictures of the sun, moon, stars, plants, trees, and animals.			The paintings on the wigwam are not in Leland or Rand.
And inside this wigwam there was said to live a very great, rich, powerful, and supposedly handsome Invisible Being.	… in which dwelt a being who was always invisible.	… lived a youth whose teomul was a moose. This youth had the power of assuming the form of a moose, and in addition to this, he could render himself invisible.
However, no one could see him, except his sister, who lived there too.
Many women wanted to marry this Invisible Being, but his sister said, “Only the one who can see him can marry him.”	He had a sister who attended to his wants, and it was known that any girl who could see him might marry him.	He offered to marry the first girl that could see him.
Now, in this village there lived a poor man who had three daughters.	There dwelt in the village an old man, a widower, with three daughters.	Now it happened that in the village there resided an old man, a widower, who had three daughters, the youngest of whom was puny and often sick.
The two older daughters were cruel and hard-hearted, and they made their youngest sister sit by the fire and feed the flames.	The youngest of these was very small, weak, and often ill, which did not prevent her sisters, especially the eldest, treating her with great cruelty. The second daughter was kinder, and sometimes took the part of the poor abused little girl, but the other would burn her hands and face with hot coals;	The others considered her a great source of trouble, and ill-treated her; the oldest girl on whom devolved the charge of the house after her mother’s death, was especially unkind to her. The second daughter was less unfriendly, and sometimes ventured to take the poor little girl’s part; but the oldest kicked and cuffed her about, and often burned her hands and face intentionally.
When the burning branches popped, the sparks fell on her.	Yes, her whole body was scarred with the marks made by torture,
In time, her hands became burnt and scarred.
Her arms too became rough and scarred.
Even her face was marked by the fire, and her beautiful long black hair hung ragged and charred.
And those two older sisters laughed at her saying, “Ha! You’re ugly, you Rough-Face Girl!”	So that people called her Oochige-askw (the rough-faced girl).	The marks, scars, and scabs that covered her gave her the name of Oochigeaskw (the girl that is covered with scabs).	Leland and Rand write that the sisters – especially the older one – mistreated her but they do not mention the sisters  verbally shaming the youngest one. Both Leland and Rand have passages with dialog later on.
And they made her life very lonely and miserable, indeed.
One day these two older sisters went to their father and said, “Father, give us some necklaces. Give us some new buckskin dresses. Give us some pretty beaded moccasins. We’re going to marry the Invisible Being.”	Now it came to pass that it entered the heads of the two elder sisters of this poor girl that they would go and try their fortune at seeing the Invisible One.	One day the older girls arrayed themselves in their finest clothes,
So their father gave them these things.
Dressed in their finest, the two girls marched through the village.	So they clad themselves in their finest and strove to look their fairest…	and went down to
All the people pointed and stared. “Look at those beautiful girls,” they said. “Surely they shall marry the Invisible Being!”			Leland and Rand do not have passages wherein the villagers stare or comment about the sisters appearance, or that ‘surely’ they will marry the Invisible Being.
And if those two girls were proud and hard-hearted before, they were even prouder now.

They walked haughtily through the village.
At last they came to the wigwam of the Invisible Being.	… and finding his sister at home went with her to take the wonted walk down to the water.	…the wigwam of the Invisible Boy, whose name was Team’ (the Moose).
And there was his sister, waiting.
Why have you come?” she asked.		They spent the afternoon with his sister, and at the proper time she invited them to walk with her down to the borders of the lake, and watch for the coming of her brother.
“We want to marry the Invisible Being,” they answered. That’s why we’re here.”			Neither source says the sisters said this directly to the Invisible ones sister.The reason for their visit is implied in the way they write about the invisible man and that women want to marry him.
“If you want to marry my brother,” she replied, “you have to have seen him. Tell me, have you seen the Invisible Being?”	Then when He came, being asked if they saw him, they said, “Certainly,” …	They went; and when she saw him, she put the usual question, “Do you see my brother?”
“Of course we’ve seen him” they insisted. “Can’t you see how pretty we are? Can’t you see the beautiful clothes we wear?		The eldest one said, “I do.” The next one said “I do not.”	Neither source includes content that indicates the sisters assert their prettyness and beautiful clothes as involved in being able to see him.
Oh yes, anyone can tell that we’ve truly seen the Invisible Being.”
“All right,” she said quietly, “if you think you’ve seen him, then tell me, “WHAT’S HIS BOW MADE OF?” And suddenly her voice was swift as lightning and strong as thunder!	… and also replied to the question of the shoulder strap or sled cord,	“Then tell me what his shoulder-strap is made of,” said the sister to the older girl	Martin uses capital letters in his book for the sister’s words throughout this section of his book,, and he says her voice was suddenly swift as lightning and strong as thunder. It is a heightened drama that does not appear in Leland or Rand.
“H-his b-b-bow?” they stammered in surprise. “His, uh, bow? We know! We know!” But turning turning desperately to one another, they whispered, “What shall we say? Let’s say its the oak tree.” So they said, “It’s the great oak tree.”	“A piece of rawhide.”	“Of a strip of raw-hide,” she replied.
“No!” said the sister of the Invisible Being. “NO!” Oh, she saw at once how they lied.	In saying which, they lied, like the rest,...
“Tell me,’ she continued, “if you think you’ve seen my brother the Invisible Being, then WHAT’S THE RUNNER OF HIS SLED MADE OF?”
“Uh, we know, we know!” cried those two sisters. But whispering feverishly again they wondered, “What shall we say? What shall we say? Let’s say it’s the green willow branch.”
“NO!” said the sister when she heard. “NO! You have not seen my brother. Now go home!”	… for they had seen nothing, and got nothing for their pains.	They went home to the wigwam, and the hunter came. They saw the load of moose-meat which he brought, and the clothing of his feet, after it was removed, but him they saw not. They remained all night, and returned the next morning to their father’s house.
“Just test us fairly!” they exclaimed. “We’ve seen him. Just don’t ask us all these silly questions!”			This “test us fairly” and framing the questions as "silly" does not appear in either source.
The next day the Rough-Face Girl went to her father and said, “Father, may I please have some beads? May I please have a new buckskin dress and some pretty moccasins? I am going to marry the Invisible Being, for, wherever I look, I see his face.”	When their father returned home the next evening he brought with him many of the pretty little shells from which weidpeskool (M.), or wampum, was made, and they were soon engaged napawejik (in stringing them).	That evening, when the old man arrived, he brought a quantity of small, beautiful, variegated shells, out of which in former times wampum was manufactured, and for which, in these later times, glass beads are substituted, and called by the name weidpeskool. He gave the to the girls, and the next day they engaged in napawejik (stringing them up).	Neither source says that the Rough Face Girl went to her father to request these items. The items were in their home.
But her father sighed. “Daughter,” he said, “I’m sorry. I have no beads left for you, only some little broken shells. I have no buckskin dress, and as for moccasins, all I have left are my own old, worn, cracked, and stretched-out pair from last year. And they’re much too big.”	That day poor little Oochigeaskw’, the burnt-faced girl, who had always run barefoot, got a pair of her father’s old moccasins,...	That day little Oochigeaskw gets an old pair of her father’s moccasins, soaks them, and asks her sisters to give her some of the pretty shells, a few of each kind. The older sister refuses, and tried to prevent the other from giving her any. She calls her a “lying little pest,” and tells her sister not to mind her. “Oh!” she answers, “the poor little thing! Let us give her some, a few of each kind.” This is done.
But she said, “Whatever you can spare, I can use.”
So he gave her these things.
Then she found dried reeds and, taking the little broken shells, she strung a necklace.

She stripped birch bark from the dead trees and made a cap, a dress, and leggings.	And having no clothes beyond a few paltry rags, the poor creature went forth and got herself from the woods a few sheets of birch bark, of which she made a dress… So she made a petticoat and a loose gown, a cap, legging, and handkerchief, and, having put on her father’s great old moccasins, – which came nearly up to her knees, – she went forth to try her luck. For even this little thing would see the Invisible One in the great wigwam at the end of the village.	Then she goes out and gets some sheets of birch bark, out of which she manages to construct a dress, making some figures on the bark, and fashioning out of it garments similar to those worn in ancient times by the Indian women, but which are now, to the great chagrin of some of the elder ones, rapidly degenerating into the fashion of their pale-faced sisters. She constructs a petticoat and loose gown, a cap, legging, and a handkerchief, and on her tiny feet she puts her father’s huge moccasins, which come up nearly to her knees, and thus arrayed she goes forth to try her luck in the celebrated wigwam at the remote end of the village.
Then with a sharp piece of bone, she carved in the bark pictures of the sun, moon, stars, plants, trees, and animals.	…putting some figures on the bark.
She went down to the lakeshore and soaked the moccasins in the water until they grew soft.	…and put them [moccasins] into water that they might become flexible to wear.	(No mention of doing anything to her father’s moccasins)
Then she molded them to her feet.
But they were still too big and they flap, flap, flapped like ducks’ feet as she walked.
Then all of the people came out of their wigwams. They pointed and stared.	Truly her luck had a most inauspicious beginning, for there was one long storm of…	She has to undergo a continuous storm of…
“Look at that ugly girl!” they laughed. “Look at her strange clothes! Hey! Hey! Hey! Go home you ugly girl! You’ll never marry the Invisible Being.”	… ridicule and hisses, yells and hoots, from her own door to that which she went to seek. Her sisters tried to shame her, and bade her stay at home, but she would not obey; and all the idlers, seeing this strange little creature in her odd array, cried “Shame!”	ridicule throughout the entire journey. Her sisters make sport of her, and order her not to go. They men and boys shout after her as she goes on in her funny dress, and cry, “Shame! Shame”!
But the Rough-Face Girl had faith in herself and she had courage. She didn’t turn back. She just kept walking right through the village.	But she went on, for she was greatly resolved; it may be that some spirit had inspired her.	But she hears them not, nor regards them, but resolutely pushes on. She succeeds in her enterprise of course.
At last she came to the lakeshore just as the sun was sinking behind the hills and the many stars came glittering out like a fiery veil in the darkening sky overhead.	Now this poor small wretch in her mad attire, with her hair singed off and her little face as full of burns and scars as there are holes in a sieve, was, for all this,	The little girl in her harlequin dress, her face covered with sores, and her hair singed off,
And there, standing by the water’s edge, was the sister of the Invisible Being, waiting.	Most kindly received by the sister of the Invisible One; …	is kindly received by the sister of Team’.
Now, the sister of the Invisible Being was a wise woman. When she looked at you she didn’t see just your face or your hair or clothes. No. When she looked at you she would look you right in the eyes and she could see all the way down to your heart. And she could tell if you had a good, kind heart or a cold, hard, and cruel one.	… for this noble girl knew more than the mere outside of things as the world knows them.	Not found in Rand.	Martin takes the few words Leland has about the Invisible ones sister and makes them explicit, presumably for young readers.
And when she looked at the Rough-Face Girl she saw at one that, though her skin was scarred, her hair burnt, her clothes strange, she had a beautiful, kind heart. And so she welcomed her dearly saying, “Ah, my sister, why have you come?”
And the Rough-Face Girl replied, “I have come to marry the Invisible Being.”			Neither source is explicit regarding what the girl said to the sister. All of that is implied.
“Ah,” said the sister very gently now. “If you want to marry him, you have to have seen him. Tell me, have you seen my brother the Invisible Being?”	And as the brown of the evening sky became black, she took her down to the lake. And erelong the girls knew that He had come. Then the sister said, “Do you see him?”	When nightfall comes on, she is invited to take a walk down to the borders of the lake to watch the young man’s return. Presently the sister sees him coming and asks her companion if she can see him.
And the Rough-Face Girl said, “Yes.”	And the other replied with awe, “yes I do, – and He is wonderful.”	She says she can.
“All right then,” said the sister, “if you have seen him, tell me WHAT’S HIS BOW MADE OF?”	“But my sister,” said the other, “what is his bow-string?”	“Tell me, if you see him, what his shoulder-strap is made of.”
And the Rough-Face Girl said “His bow? Why, it is the great curve of the Rainbow.”	“His bow-string is Ketaksoowowcht” (the Spirits’ Road, the Milky Way).	“A rainbow,” she exclaims.
“AHHHH!” exclaimed the sister in excitement. “Tell me, she asked, “if you have seen my brother the Invisible Being - WHAT’S THE RUNNER OF HIS SLED MADE OF?”	“And what is his sled-string?”		Rand only has one question; Leland adds a second one, and Martin follows Leland.
And the Rough-Face Girl, looking up into the night sky, said “The runner of his sled? Why, it is the Spirit Road, the Milky Way of stars that spreads across the sky!”	“It is,” she replied, “the Rainbow.”		Martin changes what Leland said. Leland says “bow string” and it is a rainbow; Martin says “bow” and that it is a rainbow. On second question, Leland says “sled string” and that it is a rainbow; Martin says “runner of his sled” and that it is the “Spirit Road, the Milky Way”
AHHHH” cried the sister in wonder and delight. “You have seen him! Come with me!”	“Thou hast seen him,” said the sister. And taking the girl home,	“Ah! You can see him,” says the girl. “Now let us hasten home, and get ready for him.”

And taking the Rough-Face Girl by the hand, she led her back to the great wigwam and sat her in the seat next to the entrance, the wife’s seat.		So home they hie, and the sister first strips her guest of the uncouth and uncomfortable robes, and administers a thorough ablution. All her scabs and scars come off, and her skin is beautiful and fair. She next opens her box and brings out a wedding garment, in which she directs her to array herself; then she comes her hair, braids it, and ties it up. The poor child things within herself, “I wonder what she is going to comb, for I have no hair on my head.” But under the magic tough of her friend’s hand, beautiful, flowing hair adorns her head. After she is thus prepared and arrayed, she is directed to go and occupy the side of the wigwam where the brother will sit, and to take the wife’s seat, next to the door.
Then they heard footsteps coming along the path, closer and closer. The entrance flap of the wigwam lifted up, and in stepped the Invisible Being.		Immediately after this, the young man arrives,
And when he saw her sitting there he said, “At last we have been found out,” Then, smiling kindly, he added, “And oh, my sister, but she is beautiful.” And his sister said, “Yes.”		comes in laughing, and says Wajoolkoes (“So we are found, are we?)? Alajull aa (“Yes”), she answers.
The sister of the Invisible Being then gave the Rough-Face Girl the finest of buckskin robes and a necklace of perfect shells. “Now bathe in the lake,” she said, “and dress in these.	… she bathed her, and as she washed her…
So the Rough-Face Girl bathed in the waters of the lake.
Suddenly all the scars vanished from her body.	… all the scars disappeared from face and body.
Her skin grew smooth again and her beautiful black hair grew in long and glossy as a raven’s wing.	Her hair grew again; it was very long, and like a blackbird’s wing.  Her eyes were like stars.
Now anyone could see that she was, indeed, beautiful.	In all the world was no such beauty. Then from her treasures she gave her a wedding garment, and adorned her. Under the comb, as she combed her, her hair grew. It was a great marvel to behold.
But the Invisible Being and his sister had seen that from the start.
Then at last the Rough Face Girl and the Invisible Being were married.	Then, having done this, she bade her take the wife’s seat in the wigwam – that by which her brother sat, the seat next the door. And when he entered, terrible and beautiful, he smiled and said “Wajoolkoos!”  “So we are found out!” “Alajulaa.” “Yes,” was her reply. So she became his wife.	So he takes her for his wife.
They lived together in great gladness and were never parted.		Rand’s version continues. In total the story appears on pages 101-109. From page 101 to 104, the story is much like what Leland tells. On subsequent five pages, the story of the couple is happy for a short while but then it takes tragic turns.