Censorship Roundup

Corpus Christi, TX: The Gregory-Portland Independent School District has decided to keep Athletic Shorts: Six Stories (Greenwillow, 1991) by Chris Crutcher on the shelves at Gregory-Portland Junior High School library, despite a parent's complaint about its sexual content and foul and racist language.

Escambia County, FL: The Escambia County School District has banned teachers from using The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain in classes below the 11th grade. The January decision was made after a parent said the racially charged novel made her seventh-grade son at Ransom Middle School uncomfortable. The book will remain accessible to middle school students at the district's school libraries.

Hollis, NH: A parent's attempt to remove a sex book by Dr. Ruth Westheimer from the Hollis/Brookline Middle School library failed when the school board voted to keep Dr. Ruth Talks to Kids (Macmillan, 1993) in circulation. The Hollis/Brookline Cooperative school board voted unanimously on February 4 to uphold a library review committee's decision to keep the book. Parent Peggy Slater had requested the book's removal due to sexually explicit content. Ironically, no student had checked the book out in the last 10 years.

Lucedale, MS: The George County school board has declined parent Robert Shepard's request to lift a ban on three books, including John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, from school reading lists and library shelves (see February 2003 , News, p. 24). Also banned are Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried (Houghton, 1990) and Fallen Angels (Scholastic, 1988) by Walter Dean Myers. Board member Larry McDonald says, "Of Mice and Men is the second most banned book in high schools across America. Fallen Angels is No. 21. So I don't feel like we're out of the mainstream by the decision we made to ban these books."