For fun, I read my son Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel by Virginia Lee Burton. I loved this book as a child, and while I know my son is still too young to sit still (he’s just 18 months), I read it while he played. I still enjoy it, and I can hope my son will enjoy it when he’s old enough as well.
There is a vehicle-powered story in Mike Mulligan. Mike Mulligan’s machine (his best friend Mary Anne) goes fast and saves the town while everyone watches. Even better, a little boy gives a winning suggestion to keep Mary Anne useful. I love that the boy’s encouragement to Mike helps him work faster and that he comes up with the answer to the Mary-Anne-is-now-stuck-in-the-bottom problem, making a kid the hero of this machine story.
And yet, reading it as an adult gives me a new perspective. There is a sense of sadness surrounding the story. Mike Mulligan is about how changing technology makes the familiar technology of the past obsolete. Now, Mike has no job with his limited skill set and equipment. Mike’s plight and Mary Anne’s inevitable (or is it?) “death” make the reader sad that there are no jobs for steam shovels and operators. Mike Mulligan is a mournful reminder of the constantly changing world and the inevitable stage in everyone’s life: that of old age and uselessness.
Then again, maybe it is just a fun story. That’s how I will always see it, in fact. I can’t help but read the story with growing excitement in my voice as I read: the day passes, Mary Anne digs, and we wonder. Will Mike Mulligan finish in time?
Thankfully, Mike always will finish on time, and Mary Anne will live on forever as the city hall’s boiler. All is as it should be.
