Author: Margi Preus
Illustrator: Jaime Zollars
Publisher: Abrams Books for Young Readers
Pages: 48
Grade Level: K - 4
ISBN: 978-1419756719
Dr. Kate Pelham Newcomb became a doctor in the mid-1900s after trying several jobs and professions that didn’t fit her personality. She graduated from medical school and was an excellent doctor, but very soon after she began to practice medicine, her husband became ill and they moved to northern Wisconsin for his health. Kate took care of the cabin and her husbandand. She figured that being a doctor wasn’t going to happen until years later when a neighbor needed medical help. Kate helped. Soon other people in the sparsely populated northern Wisconsin needed medical help and hospitals and doctors were too far away. Kate traveled to treat those who needed her and wished she had a hospital.
One day in school a teacher was teaching his class about what a million of something might look like and students got the idea of collecting pennies to see what a pile of pennies might look like. They decided to give the money to Doctor Kate for a hospital. The students wrote letters for donations, kept track of the pennies that came in, wrote thank you notes, saved their allowances, got local businesses to help, and the pennies poured in. Newspapers from big cities got wind of what was happening and the news spread across the country. By the end of the school year they had collected one million pennies. The pennies were piled into the school gym where people came to see the huge pile. It was a local tourist attraction! By the end of the summer, they realized that all the visitors had added more pennies and now the total was nearly doubled. Kate went on a TV show called “This is Your LIfe”, told her story and viewers were invited to send in their pennies to help build the hospital. The hospital was built and Kate began to care for people in her own hospital.
The end matter included more information and photographs of Doctor Kate.
Reviewed by Audrey Campbell, MED
Reading Specialist and Library Media Center Director
Valley Adventist Schools, Rogers Campus
