Lita Judge was born in Ketchikan, Alaska, but now lives in Peterborough, New Hampshire with her husband and two cats. She enjoys writing and illustrating children’s books from her studio tucked away in the woods. Her first book, One Thousand Tracings, won the IRA Children’s Book Award (2008), and was selected as an ALA Notable, NCTE Notable, and Michigan Notable Book. It received the NAPPA Gold Award and the Jane Addams Peace Award Honor. She has written and illustrated four more books which will soon be released with Hyperion, Viking and Roaring Brook. For more information, please visit her website.

When I was cleaning out my grandmother’s attic, I found a dusty box stuffed with aged yellowed envelopes. I was intrigued when I lifted out the first envelope, it had a German stamp postmarked 1947 and inside were two paper foot tracings. The next envelope also contained foot tracings and the next and the next. Some were cut out from newspaper in the shape of feet, others were drawn on paper, tracing the outline of an entire family’s feet, the littlest in the center with larger tracings growing outward like rings on a tree stump. The envelopes also contained letters, lists of food and clothing, and photographs.

I carried the box downstairs to show my mom. “You found the tracings,” she said, reaching for an envelope.

Mom held the tracings like treasured belongings. “We searched everywhere to find shoes for them all,” she said. Mom told me she remembered piles of shoes when she was a little girl, and boxes filled with clothes and food to send to people starving in Europe after World War II. This was the first time I had heard that my grandparents had organized a relief effort after the war. I looked at the photos that slipped out of the envelopes. I was struck by the faces of children, smiling back at me, 60 years after the photos had been taken.

I searched through the envelopes. There were hundreds of letters requesting help, most written in German, but some in other languages as well. Grandmother’s translated copies were also in the envelopes. The families from Europe all told of their desperate need for food and clothing. They wrote heart wrenching accounts of homes having been bombed, belongings lost, and children suffering from starvation and disease. One woman wrote lovingly of her husband and five children, but said only one child was still alive. At the bottom of her letter she wrote, “any little thing you could send would be helpful.” Little scraps of paper with lists of food and clothing in my grandmother’s hand were paper clipped to each envelope. She must have kept track of what each family received this way.

I also found thank you letters expressing deep gratitude.  “We are full of hope to our American colleagues; their friendship lets us believe once more in the future, which otherwise lay before us in frightful darkness.” one letter read. I read how the kindness that came with each package gave them hope and was as important as the urgently needed food and clothing.

I held the tracings and began to realize Grandmother had fought her own war in the aftermath of World War II. She fought to bring hope and healing to people faced with devastation. I knew I wanted to write about what she had done. But there were still so many unanswered questions. Mom was a little girl when the relief effort occurred, and my grandparents were no longer alive.

Mom remembered that the relief effort was called The Action. My grandparents were ornithologists so I searched for their articles in scientific journals from the mid 1940’s. I found bulletins where they had asked for volunteers. I looked up old friends of my grandparents and found a few still alive who had helped. These people had sent packages of food. Many had given their own shoes and clothing, not able to afford to send new items. One neighbor canned and sold vegetables from her garden to earn postage for the packages. By banding together, my grandparents and their friends and colleagues sent over 3000 packages to people from 13 countries. 

I even talked with a few of the European survivors. Some lived in Germany and Italy, others had moved to America. One woman in Germany, who was a small child just after the war, gave me copies of dozens of letters my grandmother had sent to her father with the packages. She had kept them all these years. The letters revealed how much my grandmother cared for the people she was helping, even though she had never met them. I read her anxiety over whether she’d find enough clothing and shoes for everyone, and how she apologized that she couldn’t do more. She always included toys for the children and small luxuries like candles, pencils and chocolate. She sent soap after learning that many hadn’t had any for two years.

While writing and illustrating this story, war broke out in Iraq, a tsunami hit Asia and the hurricane and flooding that devastated the southeast of our own country occurred. I realized, sadly, One Thousand Tracings was relevant to current events. So many people are facing great losses now. Uncovering my family’s story made me realize we can make a difference in the lives of those suffering by caring enough to act. By working together with our friends and neighbors we can accomplish tasks that seem insurmountable.

I thought hard about how to write this story for children who may not be familiar with World War II, or might find the loss experienced by so many families overwhelming. I decided to tell it through my mother’s perspective,  when she was a small child. I wrote the words: “The men had fought their battles during war. Now Mama and I fought our own battle./ A battle to keep families alive./ To keep them safe from cold and hunger./ Families we didn’t know,/ yet we grew to love them.”

I sifted through the hundreds of letters from European families. Each family had a unique experience of hardship, but they all shared much in common - the pain and shame after a disastrous war, the loss of property and jobs, and most of all, the loss of loved ones. I chose to focus on one family.

I used actual letters written by this German family. Their words could tell the story best - how they had lost their home and were waiting to hear news of Father, still missing after serving as a doctor. The letters revealed hope after receiving gifts of food and clothing and gratitude for this kindness. The story shows the growing friendship between the two little girls, my mother and the German girl named Eliza, and the joy my family felt after hearing that the German father returned safe.

When I began illustrating One Thousand Tracings, I wanted to focus on the human connections. I knew immediately that I wanted to include the foot tracings and photos I had found. These artifacts showed so clearly that the people in this story were real. I designed collages of tracings, letters and photographs for the end leavesof the book. I also included foot tracings opposite an illustration within the book. I used photographs of cans of food from the late 1940’s, a pair of children’s shoes, a picture of Eliza, and other objects appropriate to the story. The German father painted a picture of a swallow for my mother after he learned an American family had helped his family survive. I included this on the final illustration. Once I had the images of historical artifacts, I was ready to create the illustrations for my picture book. I painted soft watercolors in a color tone reflecting the time period. I depicted my mother and grandparents and their simple farmhouse, showing they weren’t wealthy, but they found ways to give.

One Thousand Tracings doesn’t focus on the war, or the fact that my grandparents helped people who fought on the opposite side. I didn’t want to make judgments about the people they helped - most were mothers and children. There is no discussion of who the enemy was or who the victims were. Rather, I focused on the healing that occurred through brave acts of kindness. I focused on what can unite us after war. My grandparents' story is a powerful reminder of the importance of humanitarianism. Perhaps this book can be a means for opening discussions with children about how healing can begin after the destruction of war. I found a letter my grandmother wrote. I think her words are best: “Those who sent packages to former enemies had courage…The value of the packages sent was minimal compared to that precious commodity – hope.”

Posted November 2008