HAVERHILL — Second-graders at Walnut Square School have been hard at work making dolls out of apples — and at the same time, learning about important historical figures.
Bailey Gates, one of Christine O'Leary's second-graders, made a doll that depicts Ruby Bridges, a young girl who was a couple of years younger than she is when she became famous. Art teacher Bonnie Porter instructs the Walnut Square children every third school day.
Who was Ruby Bridges? She was the first African-American child to attend a previously all-white school in the South, in 1960. Despite the protests and insults from numerous white parents, she was enrolled as a kindergartner at an elementary school in New Orleans, where she still lives.
Bailey, who pared down an apple to make Ruby's head and used yarn for hair, is obviously too young to recall the days of segregation. She noted that it would not make any difference if she were black, an American Indian or an Eskimo, she'd still be allowed to attend Walnut Square School.
Bailey said she wasn't sure how long it took to create her image of Ruby Bridges, but, "I liked doing it," she said. Like the other students, she used rolled-up newspaper and wires to fashion the body of her doll. The clothing was made from felt.
Her classmate, Nikolai Ahern, picked a more famous person, Abraham Lincoln. While his representation of the 16th president is mostly complete, he said he still needs to give him a beard and hat. Nikolai said he'll use yarn for Lincoln's beard and possibly felt to create a stovepipe-style hat.
Alex Archambault readily identified his character's claim to fame.
"He invented the light bulb," he said when asked about Thomas Edison's best-known accomplishment. Like his peers, Alex is being raised in the age of CDs, but he said his parents have told him how people used to listen to music on records.
He seemed pleased to learn that it was Edison who invented the phonograph, the first sound recording and reproduction device.
Other students made dolls representing Martin Luther King Jr., baseball standout Roberto Clemente, Leonardo da Vinci, Amelia Earhart, Marco Polo and Squanto, the American Indian who taught the Pilgrims how to grow corn and keep from starving to death.
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