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Small Gestures
Edward P. Moser is here to set the record straight. “Since the start of its construction In “The Hundred Choices Department 230 years ago,” he reminds us, “the Capitol Store,” a novel for young readers (grades has witnessed an astonishing amount of tur4-7), Ginger Park paints a bleak but inspirA Compendium of Readers, Writers, Books, & Events moil, bloodshed, and controversy.” ing picture of privation and oppression in In “The Lost History of the Capitol: by Karen Lyon war-torn Korea. Based on her own mother’s The Hidden and Tumultuous Saga of Conlife, Park tells the story through the eyes of gress and the Capitol Building,” Moser tells Mikooki, now an old woman, who was a girl more than thirty stories of duels, canings, riwhen Japan occupied Korea in WWII. ots, bombings, assassination attempts, and School, she tells us, was little more than bootlegging—all of which took place in or child labor—darning socks, polishing boots, near the Capitol. Among the highly dramatic and sewing buttons onto military uniforms accounts are the 1835 beating of a congress“for the war effort.” Worst of all was a nightman by ex-senator Sam Houston; the 1890 marish stint in a dye factory, where the imshooting death of a former representative by age of “ghost-like children hunched over the beleaguered reporter whom he had “bulthe iron vats” haunted her sleep for years lied, browbeaten, and outright beaten”; and to come. the 1954 assault on Congress by Puerto RiMiyooki’s load is lightened by the love can separatists, which left five representaof her older brother, who looks out for her Local historian and tour tives wounded. and supplements her meager school rations guide Edward P. Moser deWhile Moser acknowledges that the inscribes more than 30 drawith bowls of noodles, and by the wealth of matic incidents involving surrection on January 6 “ranks among the her parents, who co-own a luxury departthe Capitol and Congress wildest events in the building’s more than ment store that caters to a haughty Japanese in “The Lost History of the Capitol.” two centuries of existence,” he describes anclientele. “Japan occupied my country,” she other deadly writes defiantly, “but not my heart.” riot that took place on election day in Struggling to make a life for herself, and 1857, when two gangs supported by the angirl who must find the courage to leave her home beinspired by the face of the hollow-eyed boy ti-immigrant Know-Nothing Party—the Plug Uglies hind and rise above the sorrows of her times. she met in the factory, Miyooki helps her mother in from Baltimore and the local Rip Raps—tried to disGinger Park is the award-winning author of five her work with orphans. “Small gestures are never rupt the vote. The president called out the Marines, children’s books, including “My Freedom Trip: A forgotten,” her mother assures her—and dreams of who eventually prevailed, but not before “eight to Child’s Escape from North Korea,” and “Goodbye, a day when she can escape the misery around her. ten people lay dead or fatally wounded, and twenty 382 Shin Dang Dong,” which Newsweek magazine Miyooki’s mother also advises her to “tell a story, to thirty others were wounded.” All were spectators. called “the perfect all-American story.” A lifelong something meaningful.” And that is just what Ginger “A locus of so much power and wealth inevitaresident of the Washington area, she is co-owner Park has done in this achingly beautiful tale of a brave bly leads to considerable bad along with the good,” of CHOCOLATE CHOCOLATE in writes Moser. As the defining symbol of our neighdowntown DC. www.parksisters.com borhood, the Capitol embodies all the beauty, richThe virtual book launch for “The ness, idiosyncrasy—and occasional ugliness—of our Hundred Choices Department Store” nation itself. “The Lost History of the Capitol” is will be on March 23 at 6 pm at www.polan entertaining introduction to the many stories it iticsandprose.com. has to tell. Edward Moser is a historian, tour guide, and ‘Capitol’ Crimes author who served as a speechwriter for George and Misdemeanors H.W. Bush and editor of Time-Life Books. His pre“Never shall I forget my tortured feelings vious books include “The White House’s Unruly when I beheld that noble edifice wrapt in Neighborhood” and “A Patriot’s A to Z of America.” flames,” wrote a horrified Dr. James Ewell in 1814. The local doctor was a witness The Women’s Tour to the torching of the US Capitol by deIn Ginger Park’s novel for young readers, “The HunFrom the Alpha Kappa Alpha mural at Howard Uniparting British troops, who left a smoldred Choices Department versity to a painted tribute to Native American addering path of destruction in their wake. Store,” an old woman tells vocate Zitkala-Ša, Washington boasts a host of sites the story of her girlhood in Lest recent events tempt us to believe Japanese-occupied Korea dedicated to women’s stories. Tour guides and cothat our times are unique in DC history, during WWII.
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