‘The Legend of Johnny Appleseed’

JOHNNY CHAPMAN stood in the barnyard and looked around. Behind him, he could hear the happy voices of the 10 younger Chapman children. His large family was a loving one, but it was 1797 and Johnny was 23 years old. It was time to be on his own.

Johnny was excited. He was a little bit scared too. No longer would he live in the family’s simple Massachusetts farmhouse. No longer would he tend the farm animals.

He would leave farm and family behind. He would walk westward, to the frontier, to new land where few people lived.

There wasn’t much he needed for the trip. He had the clothes on his lanky body, a bit of cornmeal and some dried food called hardtack.

Spring had come, and each day grew warmer. Crops burst through the soil in the fields. Birds were building new nests.

The Chapmans did not have enough land for an orchard, as some of their neighbors did, but they did have a few apple trees in the yard, now white with snowy blossoms.

Johnny would miss those apple trees. From them, the Chapmans made chewy dried apples, applesauce and rich apple butter to spread on thick bread. Everyone in the family drank apple juice and apple cider. Best of all, they feasted on apple tarts and apple pie for dessert.

He reached into the pocket of his worn coat. There were a few coins, but he was searching for something more important. Yes, it was there -- his bag of precious apple seeds from the family farm.

Johnny Chapman looked toward the nearby woods. With the farmhouse so crowded, he had often spent long days in those woods. Many nights he had slept on a bed of leaves, looking up through the trees and watching the starry sky.

Johnny was a gentle man. The animals knew him as a friend who might tend to an injured rabbit or bird but would never aim a gun at any creature.

Now, as he walked west to new lands, the outdoors would be Johnny Chapman’s bedroom.

*

Tuesday: What will Johnny find as he walks west?

This story will be on The Times’ website at latimes.com/kids.