The Tale of Jasper Jay

Arthur Bailey was born in 1877 in Vermont. He is the author of more than 40 children's books. After going to Harvard he became of wholesale grocery merchant in Chicago. Bailey began writing his stories for his stepchildren. His stories centered on animals with natural history woven into the plots. Bailey used language that never talked down to children. He frequently used words beyond their vocabulary in an effort to broaden their knowledge. The Tale of Jasper Jay was written in 1917 and is part of the Tuck-Me-In series. The story begins "Some of the feathered folk in Pleasant Valley said that old Mr. Crow was the noisiest person in the neighborhood. But they must have forgotten all about Mr. Crow's knavish cousin, Jasper Jay. And it was not only in summer, either, that Jasper's shrieks and laughter woke the echoes. Since it was his habit to spend his winters right there in Farmer Green's young pines, near the foot of Blue Mountain, on many a cold morning Jasper's ear-splitting "_Jay! jay!_" rang out on the frosty air."