1. Setting

2. Author Christopher Paul Curtis Publisher DelacortePress Copyright 1995 The Watsons Go to Birmingham — 1963

3. Setting is made up of two elements.

4. Time Past – Present – Future Place Location of story’s events

5. Clues about the time period of the story The book’s title refers to the year 1963. The Watsons drove a 1948 Plymouth named the “Brown Bomber.” True-Tone AB-700 Ultra-Glides were used in cars from 1957–1968. The TV news anchor’s name was Walter Cronkite. Popular singers at the time were Nat King Cole and Dinah Washington.

6. Kenny’s favorite song was The Coasters’ “Yakety Yak”

7. The most important text clue is the reference to Kenny helping his sister leave the church where the bombing of the Sixteenth Avenue Baptist Church took place on September 15, 1963, in Birmingham, Alabama. Birmingham Post-Herald BOMB BLAST KILLS 4 CHILDREN INJURES 17 AT CHURCH HERE

8. The journey from Flint, Michigan, in the North to Birmingham, Alabama, in the segregated South was approximately 850 miles. In 1963, the Watsons planned to drive that distance in three days.

9. TimePlace The story would not have been the same if it had taken place in a different time period. The bombing at the church in Birmingham during the Civil Rights Movement, an event that actually happened, affects the family—especially Byron and Kenny. The story would not have been the same if the locations had been different. The family travels from a large city in the North to a large city in the segregated South. The story would have been entirely different if the locations had been different or if the trip had happened in reverse.

10. Setting