This is a tale of a little ten-year-old girl from the remote mountain districts of Tennessee. She comes to live with her grandmother and has her first glimpse of glass windows and many other things which are commonplace to the outside world, but strange and wonderful to her.

The background and customs are authentic, the author having portrayed a very interesting pioneer type of living which actually exists side by side with our skyscrapers and airplanes.

Girls will find Mary Ellen's adventures realistic and different. So much of American traditions and folklore are incidental to the action of the book that it is a valuable social study in the form of fiction.

From the dust jacket

May Justus puts into her juvenile stories of East Tennessee Mountain people her personal warmth of feeling and inspiration. She knows the tang of October mornings in the Cumberland Mountains, the sweetness of frost-bitten persimmons, the sociability of a quilting bee, the gaiety of old-fashioned games and balled singing. She knows, too, the unfailing courage and ingenuity with which the mountain people face a frugal existence. And because she knows all these things about the people she loves, she writes with effective simplicity.

Here is the story of a ten-year-old girl, Mary Ellen, who came from the far side of Big Log Mountain to live with Granny Allen. Going to a school with glass windows, attending the Mission Fair where Granny's quilt won first prize, taking a momentous expedition to town to buy shoes, turning a Thanksgiving dinner, which promised to be a spare little meal, into a real feast, meeting outlanders with the innate courtesy of her people, making new friends, and entering into the life of the little community with a joyous and hearty good will—all these adventures fill to overflowing Mary Ellen's life at Granny Allen's. The book is distinguished by a charm and flavor and authenticity of detail characteristic of an author who writes about her own folks with the deepest affection and appreciation.

For ages 7-12

From the dust jacket of the edition titled Mary Ellen