Lyddie

It’s 1843 in the woods of Vermont, and there is a black bear in 13-year-old Lyddie Worthen’s cabin. Bravely, Lyddie is able to “stare down the bear,” protecting her Mama and her younger siblings: 10-year-old Charlie, six-year-old Rachel, and baby Agnes. But though Lyddie and the other children are able to laugh at the whole incident, Mama sees the bear as a sign that the end of the world is near.

The next day, Mama wants to take the family to her sister Clarissa’s house, abandoning the Worthen home. Lyddie opposes this plan, as Clarissa and her husband Judah are religious zealots. And more than that, Lyddie fears that if they leave their cabin, her father—gone off in search of money to repay the family’s debts—might never return. Eventually, Lyddie convinces Mama that she and Charlie should tend to the struggling farm through the winter, while Mama and the two younger girls go to visit Clarissa.

Lyddie and Charlie survive the winter, with an assist from their kindly neighbor Quaker Stevens and his oldest son, Luke. As soon as spring arrives, however, Lyddie gets a letter from Mama: to pay the family debt, Mama has sold Lyddie and Charlie into indentured servitude. Lyddie will work at the local tavern, while Charlie will work at the flour mill. Lyddie cannot bear the idea of their separation, so to cheer his sister up, Charlie jokes about Mama’s poor spelling in the letter: she has written “we can still hop,” misspelling the word “hope.”

Lyddie and Charlie set off to their new lives, though they first sell their calf to Quaker Stevens, who gives them 25 dollars for it. Luke Stevens then drives Lyddie and Charlie into town, promising to look in on the Worthen cabin while the children are away. Lyddie feels a strange mix of frustration, gratitude, and nervousness around Luke.

Right away, the tavern proves difficult. Mistress Cutler, the owner, is cruel and demanding, accusing Lyddie of theft despite her excellent work ethic. Many of the customers are rude men or silent, vicious “slave catchers”—though there are also factory girls, farmers’ daughters who now earn up to two dollars a week in the Massachusetts textile mills. Lyddie takes solace with the cook Triphena, who admires the young girl’s tenacity. And through it all, Lyddie thinks of Charlie’s promise: “we can still hop.”

One week, Mistress Cutler heads to Boston, and Triphena encourages Lyddie to take a trip home. When Lyddie arrives at Charlie’s new house, Charlie is not there, and Lyddie struggles to suppress her envy when she realizes that the miller and his wife have enrolled Charlie in school. Lyddie then heads to her family’s cabin—and she is shocked to learn that a Black man named Ezekial Abernathy has taken up residence there.

Ezekial explains that he is escaping enslavement via the Underground Railroad; Quaker Stevens suggested he hide here. At first, Lyddie considers turning Ezekial in and collecting the $100 bounty for doing so. But after Lyddie learns more about Ezekial and his family, she has a change of heart, impulsively giving Ezekial all the money she has saved. Ezekial promises to pay her back once he reaches freedom at the Canadian border.

When Lyddie returns to the tavern, Mistress Cutler, having discovered Lyddie’s absence, fires her in a fit. Triphena tries to convince Lyddie to stay, but Lyddie has plans of her own: she wants to become a factory girl. Triphena disapproves of this idea, but she lends Lyddie some money for the trip to the textile mills in Massachusetts.

The journey to the factory town of Lowell, Massachusetts is long, arduous, and expensive. Along the way, Lyddie makes friends with a coachman; in Lowell, the coachman then introduces Lyddie to his sister Mrs. Bedlow, who runs a boardinghouse there. Mrs. Bedlow is warm, and she helps Lyddie get a job as a factory weaver the very next day.

Before her first day of work, Lyddie meets her new roommates: prim, devout Amelia, sweet Prudence, and wry Betsy. Lyddie then heads to the factory floor. Mr. Marsden, the overseer, shouts some instructions to Lyddie, but she can barely hear him over the screeching din of the machines. Fortunately, a girl named Diana Goss helps Lyddie, showing her how to maneuver the heavy shuttles and perform a procedure known as “the kiss of death.” Diana also promises to teach Lyddie how to read, though Amelia discourages this, as Diana is a known “radical.” Eventually, Lyddie learns that Diana is a leader of the “ten-hour movement,” advocating for shorter workdays and better working conditions.

Though the weaving is exhausting work, Lyddie soon becomes one of the most efficient workers on the floor. And as Lyddie adjusts to life in Lowell, Betsy and Diana help her improve her reading and writing. Lyddie falls in love with the Charles Dickens novel Oliver Twist, and she sees parallels between Oliver’s life and her own, equally governed by fear of the poorhouse. Lyddie also writes to Charlie, showing off her improved penmanship—though Charlie never responds, much to Lyddie’s disappointment.

Months pass, and Lyddie is making more money than she ever could have imagined (plus Ezekial, having reached Canada, sends Lyddie 50 dollars). But life at the factory is far from perfect. Many of the girls—including Prudence and Betsy—develop a hacking, life-threatening cough. Mr. Marsden makes sexual advances on Lyddie, though she dodges them. And though Lyddie refuses to participate in Diana’s activism, the working conditions are getting worse. Still, Lyddie persists, desperate only to earn and save money even as Betsy and the others sign Diana’s petition and chant “I will not be a slave.”

Lyddie also gets bad news on the family front. First, she learns baby Agnes has died; then, she learns that her uncle Judah has put Mama in a mental hospital. To pay Mama’s medical bills, Judah plans to sell Lyddie’s cabin. Judah also asks Lyddie to take care of Rachel, claiming Clarissa is too ill to do so. Though Lyddie does not know how she will provide for Rachel, the young girl becomes one of the rare bright spots in Lyddie’s life—until Charlie arrives, informing Lyddie that the millers want to take Rachel in, too. Lyddie feels abandoned by Charlie, who seems to have found a surrogate “family” with the millers (and away from her). A few months later, Lyddie learns that Mama, too, has died.

Now, most of the original factory girls have left, replaced by Irish immigrants like Lyddie’s new colleague Brigid. Brigid struggles at first, but she and Lyddie gradually become close friends. One day, when Mr. Marsden tries to assault Brigid, Lyddie intervenes, pouring water on his head. The next day, the factory fires Lyddie for “moral turpitude.”

“The bear had won,” Lyddie thinks; she has lost her family, her home, and her job. Unsure of what else to do, Lyddie returns to the Worthen cabin. To her great surprise, Luke Stevens is there. Luke explains to Lyddie that he has bought the cabin, and he tells her that he hopes to marry her one day. Lyddie realizes she has feelings for Luke—but before she can marry him, she wants to go to Oberlin college and get her degree. The story ends with Lyddie resolving to “stare down all the bears,” facing difficult circumstance and her own internal struggles with bravery and “hop.”