The year is 1912.
Female suffragettes are fighting for the right to vote, Teddy Roosevelt’s daughter can drive a car, and brassieres (thought to be scandalous since they left little to the imagination) are replacing corsets.

12-year-old Eleanor Hill is growing up in this fascinating time. She desperately wants to become an independent woman, who unlike her sisters, dreads becoming a housewife.

Lisa Williams Kline,
who lives in Mooresville, North Carolina, paints a vivid picture of life in Eleanor’s small fishing village, called Atlantic Grove. Eleanor Hill, her first ever book, is loosely based on Kline’s grandmother, Eleanor Hill Verra. Eleanor Hill, in the book, is a strong character that will inspire other young girls to shoot for the stars.

Joanne:
I’d like to welcome Lisa to the cyber-interview on Fresh Air.
Thank you, Lisa, for joining us.

What inspired you to write a book based on your grandmother's experiences?

Lisa:
At the funeral of my grandmother, Eleanor Hill Verra, I learned that she was one of the first young women in New Bern, North Carolina to learn to drive a car. I was impressed -- she probably learned to drive about 1912, a time when it wasn't really "acceptable" for women to drive cars, and cars were also much, much harder to drive back then. I began to wonder what it might have been like for Eleanor, to become a teen-ager at about the time the Titanic sank, and to want a life that was better than the one she had. Later, my mother gave me my grandmother's photo album from about 1914-1918 and the letters she had saved over the years.

As I looked through those pictures of my grandmother posing on the beach (in bathing suits that covered her from head to toe!) or beside Model T's with friends, family members, or boyfriends, I became fascinated with the time in which she grew up. The automobile and the telephone were beginning to change the world, and women in several states had won the vote. It was an exciting time of great change -- yet the women where my grandmother lived were mostly expected to marry and start having children at about 14. I wondered what gave my grandmother the independent spirit that enabled her to follow her own path, rather than going along with the crowd. I hope that by writing about her I could soak up some of that spirt and pass it on to a new generation of young women.

Joanne:
What do you think pre-teens and teenagers will take from ELEANOR HILL?

Lisa:
I hope pre-teens and teenagers will take away a sense that if a girl as young as Eleanor could overcome poverty, a lack of education, and isolation to make a better life for herself and her family, then it opens up wonderful possibilities for them, too. So many stories for girls focus on a young woman waiting for her prince to come and sweep her into a better life -- but for Eleanor that never happened. She had to make a better life for herself. Eventually she did marry and have a child (obviously, since I'm here!) but it was scandalously late -- she was over 30.

Joanne:
Did you feel like Eleanor Hill in any way as a child (meaning did you want more than marriage or being a housewife)?

Lisa:
I always assumed I would have a career, and was lucky in many ways. My childhood was much more privileged than Eleanor's -- I always knew I would be going to college and probably graduate school. Both of my parents are teachers and education was very important. I did not have the same challenges Eleanor had I was also lucky because I always knew I wanted to be a writer. Even in first grade I wrote and illustrated stories for my own entertainment. I knew writing would be a very difficult career choice, but I was very persistent and determined to succeed. (Maybe I get that from my grandmother! ) I think having something you love, a "passion--" as I have writing -- is one of the major keys to happiness in life. In the book Eleanor's teacher talks about "finding your True Path" and I really believe if you can find it, you will be happy.

Joanne:
What would your grandmother think of ELEANOR HILL?

Lisa:
My grandmother would probably have mixed feelings. She would be very honored at the tribute to her, but she didn't see herself as a heroine, and might feel a little embarrassed that I portray her as one. Sometimes, for dramatic purposes, I have given Eleanor credit for things that were really accomplished by other people in her family, and she might feel awkward about that. Eleanor's older brothers all left home for California when she was a girl, and they never came back. She was very attached to one of her brothers in particular, and missed him a lot. In the book, I have him come back, and I believe she would have liked that very much.

Joanne:
Who would be most like the character Eleanor Hill in today's society,
and why?

Lisa:
I tried to portray Eleanor as a girl who felt the restrictions that society tried to place on her but she dared to be different. So I guess any woman who dares to be different in today's world is like Eleanor. Women in traditionally male jobs, women who own businesses, women in the space program, women in the arts, women who are willing to "step outside the box" even in small ways. But she was really just an ordinary person -- not a bigger than life heroine -- and she had a pretty ordinary life -- so I hope many girls can identify with her.

Joanne:
Thank you Lisa for being with us.
I would like to thank Lisa for allowing us to reproduce the first chapter from her book for you to enjoy.

"Eleanor Hill" Excerpt
Chapter 1: Sand Crabs and Suffragettes

Eleanor had been helping Papa mend his fishnet and was late for school, but she stole one minute to climb the pile of oyster shells next to the fish shack. The pile was as tall as a house, bleached white except for the new purple-hued shells on top, and it glinted in the sun like a magic mountain. The fishermen were checking the sails on their sharpies, and the women were busy with chores, so there was no one looking, no one to shout, "Eleanor Hill, get down from there! Climbing is not ladylike!" She scrambled to the summit, the shells crunching under her lace-up school shoes.

From the top of the pile she could see the sails of Papa's sharpie, named Annis H after her mother, as he headed out to fish. Across the sound was the Outer Banks, a thin sliver of green on a pink horizon lit from behind with a steady brightness where the sun was getting ready to rise. To the north was the Neuse River, and a two-hour ride on the mailboat got you to New Bern, one of the biggest cities in North Carolina.

The fall wind off the sound was cold, and Eleanor pulled her sweater tight around her. Suddenly the red edge of the sun popped into view. School! She clambered down the oyster pile, pounded down the dirt path past Mr. Fulcher's store, past the whitewashed Church of Two Hundred Trees, and slid behind her wooden desk at Atlantic Grove Academy.

Miss Rosalie, her back to the class, was writing the date, "Tuesday, November 12, 1912," and listing classwork on the board. She wore her shiny dark hair swept up in an elegant bun that Eleanor tried to imitate at home. Virgie Mae, Eleanor's best friend, shot her a questioning look with one eyebrow raised.

"Mending Papa's fishing net," Eleanor mouthed, acting out a sewing motion. Virgie Mae made a sympathetic face.

Still catching her breath, Eleanor opened her desk to get out her tablet. She noticed Nat Taylor watching her with a funny crooked grin. Just as she put her hand inside the desk, she heard a furious scratching, and something pinched her hard.

"Owww!" She yanked her hand out of the desk. A six-inch sand crab gripped her index finger. There were shrieks from the children around her.

Eleanor had been bitten by crabs plenty of times. She gave her hand a powerful shake and the crab flew across the room, slid over Adeline Fulcher's desk, and fell on the floor. Adeline, who was only seven and small for her age, screamed and pulled her feet up on the seat of her chair. Sam Bynum ran toward the crab, brandishing his ruler like a sword.

Miss Rosalie's skirt whirled as she turned to face the children. "Each of you in your seat this instant!" Chair legs scraped as all fifteen of them obeyed.

Meanwhile the crab had backed itself under the teacher's desk, standing high on its spindly legs and waving its sand-colored claws. Its antennae circled wildly.

Eleanor examined her finger. A bright drop of blood seeped from the puncture and grew bigger and bigger, like a red balloon. She stuck her finger in her mouth. It barely hurt at all, really.

Miss Rosalie cautiously bent down and reached one slim hand toward the crab and then withdrew it. The children laughed and cried, "Miss Rosalie's a scaredy-cat!"

"I'll get the broom!" Eleanor said, running to the closet. She wished the class wouldn't laugh at Miss Rosalie. She loved everything about their new teacher, from the way she said all her ing's to how she cocked her head when she listened to something Eleanor said. When the students went out in the schoolyard for recess, Miss Rosalie sat at her desk with her back very straight and read thick textbooks, writing careful notes. Once Eleanor saw her mending her socks, and another time, when she looked up from hopscotch, her teacher had her head on her desk.

Miss Rosalie looked grateful when Eleanor handed her the broom, and she tried to sweep the crab outside. Instead it grabbed the broomstraws and hung on for dear life. The class howled. After two rides on the end of the broom, the crab went sailing out into the sandy schoolyard. No one dared leave their seats again, but they craned their necks to see out the window.

Adeline Fulcher squeaked, "It's dead!"

But the crab was not dead, because it skittered sideways to the edge of a clump of sea grass and began to dig in a sort of frenzy, tossing clumps of sand behind it. Soon it had dug a small hole in the sand and disappeared.

"Who is responsible for this?" Miss Rosalie's voice was flat and angry. The students looked at the tops of their desks.

Eleanor glanced at Nat Taylor, who was studying the floor, his black hair flopping in his eyes. If he didn't admit it, she wasn't going to tattle on him. She removed her finger from her mouth and examined it. The bleeding had stopped.

Miss Rosalie stood at the front of the classroom, taping her ruler on her palm with a slow, measured rhythm.

"If someone doesn't step forward, there will be no recess. For anyone."

The class remained silent, but Virgie Mae, Adeline, and Ben Willis all stared at Nat. He was thirteen, and no one expected him to come back to school after this year. He would help his father fish on his two-masted sharpie, like the other older boys.

"Mr. Taylor, are you responsible for this?"

Miss Rosalie and the rest of the class waited. In the suspended silence Eleanor became aware of the silky sound of wind feathering the sea grass and the faint lapping of waves on the beach a hundred yards away.

At last Nat stifled a nervous laugh and scratched his head. "It was a joke," he mumbled.

"Step forward for your punishment," Miss Rosalie said.

Nat's worn shoes made a scuffing sound on the wooden floor as he walked to the front of the classroom. He held out his dirty hand with his palm facing up. Eleanor couldn't watch, but just before she squeezed her eyes shut, she saw that Nat was shaking. Then she heard the ruler snack once, softly. Eleanor opened her eyes in surprise. Why, that hadn't even sounded like it hurt. Their old teacher had smacked much harder and sometimes whipped their legs with cedar branches.

"You'll have no recess for one week," said Miss Rosalie in a voice that didn't sound very firm. Nat returned to his desk, and as he came down the aisle, Eleanor heard him mutter something under his breath.

"Mr. Taylor, what did you say?" Miss Rosalie's thin face was scarlet.

"My papa says you're a suffragette," he said loudly, turning around to face her.

"Two weeks without recess! Take your seat, young man!" Miss Rosalie smacked her desk with her ruler.

A few children gasped. What was a suffragette? Eleanor wondered. Something awful, clearly. Otherwise why was Miss Rosalie so upset? Later that morning while working in her Blue Black Speller Eleanor pretended she needed to look up a word in the big Webster's dictionary with the thin, crackly pages next to Miss Rosalie's desk.

There it was: "suffragette: a woman advocate of female suffrage." Well, that was no help. What was "suffrage?" Maybe it meant suffering, like having babies or something. Eleanor's older sister had a baby two years ago, and from the women's whispered talk Eleanor was sure she suffered a lot. She quickly found "suffrage," directly above "suffragette."

"Suffrage: the right to vote, especially in a political election."

So a suffragette was a woman who thought women should be allowed to vote. Eleanor returned to her seat. Over the rest of the morning, as she worked on Helen's Reading and Sandford's Arithmetic, she thought about this.

The dictionary didn't make suffragettes sound bad, but Miss Rosalie sure acted like being called one was. She had taught the class that democracy was a good form of government. If it was good for men to vote, why not women?

"Are suffragettes bad?" she asked Virgie Mae during lunch, as they sat in the schoolyard eating ham biscuits from their lunchpails. They took turns drinking water from a conch shell that was kept by the pump for that purpose. Around the back of the school they could hear Nat chopping wood for the stove in the schoolroom.

Virgie Mae twirled a thin yellow braid around her finger. "Papa says they're hooligans. He says they ought to be lined up and horsewhipped."

"Well, I swan!" Eleanor bit into a fig she had picked from a bush in her sister Iona's backyard. Inside the purplish-yellow skin was bright pink fruit.

"And my mother says their behavior is not ladylike," ladylike-she was delicate and ivory-skinned, with her powdery-looking freckles on her face-but she often complained about her mother's rules.

"What do suffragettes do?" Eleanor pressed Virgie Mae.

"I don't rightly know. Papa says they handcuff themselves to courthouse steps."

"What on earth for?"

"I don't know. And they go on hunger strikes."

"They refuse to eat?" Eleanor thought of the winter nights when Papa didn't catch anything for dinner and wondered why anyone would want to go hungry.

"I believe so." Virgie Mae licked the biscuit crumbs from her fingers, then changed the subject. "I reckon putting a sand crab in your desk must be Nat's way of saying he's sweet on you."

"How can you say such a thing, Virgie Mae Salter?" Eleanor smacked her friend's arm. "Nat Taylor is the biggest bully in Atlantic Grove! I would rather die!"

Virgie Mae's laugh was the long, teasing kind.

Reviving Ophelia:
Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls
by Mary Bray Pipher

Clinical psychologist Pipher turns her attention to female adolescence in contemporary America. Pipher examines not just the girls themselves but the society they inhabit, which she terms ``girl-poisoning.''