Sarah Morton's Day

Sarah Morton has been living in the Plimoth colony in the New World for four years, she tells readers. Now age nine, we get one jam-packed day in her life. A Pilgrim girl, she speaks in the vernacular of 1627: "Come thee with me. Let me show thee how my days are," she invites. And thus we see her milking goats, cooking meals, learning her letters, playing knickers (marbles) with friends, reciting her Bible verses, and — in a fascinating sequence of ten pictures — getting dressed: her "overgarments," which include three petticoats and a separate pocket.

Photographed on location at Plimoth Plantation, an actual living-history museum, the images are largely unposed and provide a historical verisimilitude with which young readers will easily connect.