Rennie Stroud: A Brief Summary

“The summer I was thirteen, the Japanese came to Ellis” (Dallas 1). A young girl that goes by the name, Rennie, has had her life turned upside down. Even with the war going on, the only thing the community can think about is, why would the government send the Japanese here after what happened at Pearl Harbor? Rennie Stroud’s small, quiet, town has been altered, and forever changed. The Japanese have created a negative energy throughout the entire community of Ellis. In this journal, I will be evaluating, clarifying and questioning.
As I read, Tallgrass I can evaluate how the community sees the Japanese. The citizens in the community do not tolerate the Japanese at all. They continuously gibe at the Japanese as if it were a habit. For example,

Dallas wrote, “’I believe the government ought to make them go back to where they came from’…” (Dallas 6). In the beginning of the book, Rennie Stroud disobeyed her parents, and snuck off to see the Japanese arrive to town. However, she did not know that her parents followed her, knowing she would disobey them. While every man in town seemed to despise the new townspeople, Mr. Stroud seemed to pay little attention to them. When Mr. Stroud was younger, he witnessed a crime being committed to an innocent man just because he was a different race. Ever since that day, Mr. Stroud has treated every individual equal. Eventually, Mr. Stroud would hire three Japanese to work for him in his beet fields, and a young girl to take care of the chores around the house because his sick wife cannot. This act would enrage the people in the community; men, women, even their children. This anger caused the member’s of the community to despise the Stroud’s; this tall-angry-not-so-tough older girl was bullying Rennie in school. Mrs. Stroud’s sewing circle was losing members because they did not want to be seen with the Stroud’s because of their hired help. Even though the Japanese are living in Ellis, they are kept in a internment camp. It is not their choice to be living in Ellis; they were forced to leave their homes.
Rennie has an older sister, Marthalice who lives in Denver, Colorado.

During Rennie’s summer break, her mom and her went to visit Marthalice. According to Rennie, Marthalice has changed, and not in the good way. She started swearing more and started smoking. At first I thought that Marthalice was a nice, smart, caring and family-loving person, but now I am not so sure. Rennie always had these stories about her and her sister, and they seemed wonderful. Marthalice would always give her advice, and when she moved away, she would write every week to Rennie about how Denver was. Rennie would always reply back with a question she had about life and it seemed that Marthalice had the answer. Now it seems that Marthalice has moved on; moved on from her family, and her old friends, and even Ellis. “’Maybe I don’t want to. Have you thought about that? Maybe I don’t want to go back to Ellis’” (Dallas 167). Rennie never got the intimation that Marthalice did not want to go back to Ellis. Hearing this, Rennie’s version of her sister changed and she did not know if it was her why Marthalice changed or if it was growing up. Her mind was going a million miles per hour as if it was a cheetah. It seemed that Marthalice was growing away from her small town of Ellis, and growing into her big town of

Denver.
Rennie’s grandma lives with her family because of a couple reasons.

She is getting old because her grandma is her dad’s mom. And the other reason is because she seems to forget everything about what is happening in the world, and other days she seems to have remembered everything. “From time to time, she would snap out of her dreamy world and recall something that had happened a long time ago—or as little as a moth or two ago” (Dallas 13). Rennie thinks she is crazy, however; could it be something else? To me, I think that Rennie’s grandma has Alzheimer’s, a disease where a person forgets what has happened in their life and lives a part of their life over and over. During World War II, they did not have the technology to determine mental illnesses like Alzheimer’s. Sometimes during the night, Rennie’s grandma walks around the house and will wander into the yard. Which is why Mr. and Mrs. Stroud sleep warily, so that they can hear her walk out of the house. Throughout the book, Grandma Stroud seems to be living in the past, where she is young, crazy, and in love with her husband. She has no idea who Rennie is; she doesn’t even know who her son is. Then there are those days, when she remembers everything; the day her son was born, all of her cooking recipes and about the war that is going on. Even though Rennie’s grandma is forgetful, she always seems to be loving and caring even to the strangers that live in her

house.
Through evaluating, clarifying and questioning I am able to reconnect with the book better now then when I first started to read it. Rennie Stroud’s small, quiet, town has been altered, and forever changed. Life may never be the same; it could get worse, it could get better or it could even stay the same.