Synopses & Reviews
Review
"[Author Connie Trounstine's] 48-page book, with illustrations by Kerry P. Talbott, tells the story of the table from its conception and design to its role in actual historical events involving presidents and their families.
Grant's cabinet met around the table, and each cabinet member had his own drawer for storing private papers. Calvin Coolidge signed a peace treaty on the table with 14 other nations. Barack Obama uses the table as his desk in his private office on the White House's second floor.
In her book, Trounstine, who lives in Cincinnati, notes that many presidents have left their fingerprints on the table while working to bring peace to the world. She also speculates on whether the children of any presidents might have jiggled the table's drawers and left there own fingerprints there.
Trounstine never got to see the table herself because it is in a private room that is off-limits to the public. But she hope's the table's story will stir children's curiosity, just as it did hers, and perhaps give them a personal connection to history."
—Scripps Howard News Service, July 2, 2013
"With its thick, shiny pages and its heady illustrations, Fingerprints on the Table captures us and lures us into the curious world of a place so great, it seems light years away - unreachable. Yet with her unintimidating text, [author] Trounstine delivers this seemingly inaccessible mansion and happenings right into our hands. After reading this book, children will be amazed by the fact that, while important, the presidents of the United States are indeed real people with real families, living real lives.
Both educational and entertaining, Fingerprints on the Table will inspire youngsters to want to know more!"
—Independent Publisher, Notable Review, September 2013
Synopsis
Fingerprints on the Table: The Story of the White House Treaty Table by Connie Remlinger Trounstine, illustrated by Kerry P. Talbott, tells the story about the Treaty Table, a real object that remains in the White House collection today.
Through moving illustrations, the story of the Table is told from its construction in 1869 to its use at the White House by Presidents Ulysses S. Grant to Barack Obama as a Cabinet Room Table, a setting for the signing of important peace treaties, and as a presidential workspace. The author speculates on whether the presidents' children may have also left their fingerprints on this historic object over the years.
Gold Medal Winner, Children's Non-Fiction — 2013 Living Now Book Awards
Gold Medal Winner, Juvenile (Ages 9-12) Historical Fiction — 2013 Mom's Choice Awards
About the Author
Connie Remlinger Trounstine was a reporter for 29 years at the
Kentucky Post, a Scripps Howard newspaper. Her interest in the White House Treaty Table began in 1998 when she read in an Associated Press article that: "There were cheers and shouts and handshakes in the East Room as the leaders signed the agreement on a walnut conference table used for historic occasions, beginning with the signing of the peace accord ending the Spanish-American War" in 1889. This account led her to wonder what stories such an eyewitness to our country's history might tell. Connie lives in Cincinnati, enjoys fly-fishing, and volunteers at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center. She is the author of the children's book
The Worst Christmas Ever.
Kerry P. Talbott is an award-winning illustrator who has worked for various Media General newspapers for 20 years, most notably the Richmond News Leader and Richmond Times-Dispatch. Talbott specializes in caricatures and teaches illustration and sequential imagery in the Communication Arts Department at Virginia Commonwealth University. He is based in Richmond, Virginia.