Lucy Fitch Perkins and the Twins Books

Tracking down a free PDF of The Dutch Twins (see previous post) has made me realize that a LOT of these vintage books are probably online for free.

When I was a child we had The Dutch Twins (her first book), The Eskimo Twins, and The Puritan Twins. I cherished them all. These books by Lucy Fitch Perkins (born in 1865) are unquestionably dated today, but still achieve their original goal of making children curious about how other children live all around the world. I think many of these titles are well worth tracking down!

And, according to this Los Angeles Times interview, The Dutch Twins was the book that made Beverly Cleary -- who detested the first grade early readers she was given in school -- start reading as a child and come to LOVE it!

this book, for sale on eBay, includes a signed letter
from the author to the child, dated 1931!

Here are all of the Twins books Lucy Fitch Perkins wrote, with links to the ones I have found online for free:

Geographical series

The Dutch Twins (1911)
PDF from heritage-history.com
audio recording from LibriVox

The Japanese Twins (1912)
PDF from heritage-history.com

The Irish Twins (1913)
HathiTrust digital library

The Eskimo Twins (1914)
PDF from heritage-history.com

The Mexican Twins (1916)
PDF from heritage-history.com

The French Twins (1918)
PDF from heritage-history.com

The Scotch Twins (1919)
PDF from heritage-history.com
audio recording from LibriVox

The Italian Twins (1920)
archive.org

The Swiss Twins (1922)
PDF from heritage-history.com

The Filipino Twins (1923)
HathiTrust digital library

The Farm Twins (1928)

The Pickaninny Twins (1931)

The Chinese Twins (1934)
archive.org

The Norwegian Twins (1933)

The Spanish Twins (1934)
archive.org

The Dutch Twins and Little Brother (1938)

The Dutch Twins Primer
HathiTrust digital library

Historical series

The Cave Twins (1915)
HathiTrust digital library
audio recording from LibriVox

The Spartan Twins (1918)
PDF from heritage-history.com

The Puritan Twins (1921)
PDF from heritage-history.com

The Colonial Twins of Virginia (1924)
archive.org

The American Twins of 1812 (1925)
HathiTrust digital library

The American Twins of The Revolution (1926)

The Pioneer Twins (1927)
archive.org

The Indian Twins (1938)

The Belgian Twins (1917)
PDF from heritage-history.com
audio recording from LibriVox

Note: I have moved The Belgian Twins to History because it takes place during WWI. Lucy Fitch Perkins wrote in the Preface, "This story of two little Belgian refugees is based upon the actual experience of two Belgian children, and the incident of the locket is quite true."