(3) K-3 Illustrated by Loren Long & Loren Long. In Johnson's poetic tribute to the power of hope, a young African-American boy, son of a sharecropper, dreams of following Casey Jones and his famous train out into the world, away from a life of picking cotton. Long's paintings, with their horizontal lines and strong shapes, work with the free verse to create a sense of place and a desire for change. The story is strengthened by Johnson's notes about Casey Jones.

Reviewer: Maeve Visser Knoth

(4) K-3 In singsong verse, Drummond pays tribute to Casey Jones and his final trip, when the courageous conductor sacrificed his life to save the lives of his passengers. Occasionally the cadence derails, but overall the account reverberates with the clickety-clack sound of a train rushing through the night. The accompanying watercolors both extend the action and pace the story through multiple frames that accelerate it.

Reviewer: Betty Carter

(3) K-3 Illustrated by James Bernardin. Sim Webb, the African-American fireman for legendary train engineer Casey Jones, tells of the events leading up to the crash of the Cannonball Express in 1900. Jones is seduced by an unearthly sounding seven-quill train whistle, and he insists on running the train faster than Webb feels is safe to get enough steam to play the seventh pipe. Expressive illustrations capture the drama of this event, based on the real-life disaster.

Reviewer: Henrietta M. Smith