Sunny Boy at the Seashore

Sunny Boy at the Seashore by Ramy Allison White

Sunny Boy, a cheerful five-year-old living in the city, grows excited when he learns from his mother that the family will soon drive to Nestle Cove for the summer, and he shares the news with his neighbors Nelson and Ruth Baker. Before the trip, he gets into a scrape by hitching his express wagon to the back of a laundry wagon, which runs away with him until the rope breaks and a kind stranger rescues him from a clump of bushes; the careless laundry boy is later hurt when his wagon crashes. The family, including Sunny's father and mother, Aunt Bessie, her friend Miss Martinson, and the maid Harriet, prepares for days packing and visiting Aunt Bessie's apartment, where Sunny Boy secretly tucks a box of stove polish into the picnic lunch, mistaking it for licorice. They finally set off by automobile, stopping for a farmhouse picnic where the stove-polish mistake is discovered to everyone's amusement, and reaching Nestle Cove by evening to settle into Aunt Bessie and Miss Martinson's rented bungalow. At the shore, Sunny Boy learns to float and swim with his father and Aunt Betty (as Miss Martinson asks to be called), befriends neighbor children Ellen and Ralph Gray and their cousin Stephen, and gets buried briefly when a sand fort collapses on him. He finds a lost, storm-drenched little dog during a severe thunderstorm and names him Curly, keeping him for weeks until a wealthy woman, Mrs. Raymond, recognizes the dog as her own pet Bon-Bon, brought to her from France by her soldier son before his death; she reclaims him but sends Sunny Boy a beautiful toy sailboat, The Billow, as a thank-you gift. One cross morning, after his mother reproves him, Sunny Boy sulks and secretly runs off alone to town, riding the merry-go-round and buying a soda; a kind white-haired lady (who turns out to be Mrs. Raymond) pays for his treat and drives him home, which is how Curly's identity comes to light. Sunny Boy is disciplined and feels genuine remorse. Later, while playing with Ellen and Ralph and sailing paper-doll "passengers" on their toy boats, The Billow drifts loose and out to sea; Sunny Boy takes a rowboat to retrieve it and is himself carried far out on the ocean, growing thirsty, frightened, and exhausted before falling asleep. His parents organize a search with Captain Franklin's motor-boat and find him safe, and on the way back they also recover the washed-up Billow on the beach. The story closes with Mr. Horton announcing a business trip to New York that will take Sunny Boy and his mother away from Nestle Cove for several weeks, as Aunt Bessie and Miss Martinson prepare to return home for the start of the school term and Sunny Boy says goodbye to his seashore playmates Ellen and Ralph.

By Ramy Allison White · First published 1920 · Genre: Children's Literature, Domestic Fiction, Coming-of-Age · 15 chapters · 35,580 words

First lines

"Oh, Ruth! Oh, Nelson! O-hoo! " Sunny Boy puckered up his mouth and tried his best to whistle, but he couldn't quite manage it.

"Ru-th! Nelson! " he shouted again. "Come on over! I want to tell you something!"

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children's fiction · coming-of-age · summer vacation · seashore setting · family adventure · childhood innocence · friendship · moral development · mischief and consequences · lost pet · toy sailboat · swimming

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Sunny Boy at the Seashore is listed on Textopian as a novel by Ramy Allison White, dated 1920 CE.

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