Molly feels that everything in her life has changed when her father goes off to England to help wounded soldiers and her beloved aunt joins the Women's Airforce Service Pilots. Includes a section on women pilots in the armed services, and a project related to the story.

When her friend Nellie, the servant girl from next door, does not show up for ice skating as usual, Samantha is afraid that Nellie will not come to her party because she cannot afford to bring presents. Includes a section on ice skating in the early 1900s.

In colonial Williamsburg, nine-year-old Felicity's dancing skills improve when she changes from wearing clumsy shoes to dainty slippers but ultimately she learns that "Gracefulness is in the foot, not the shoe." Includes information on the education of girls in colonial America, focusing on dance, and presents square dance instructions.

In 1934 Kit finds that she has hard lessons to learn about the Depression both at home, where she is helping her mother run a boarding house while her father looks for a new job, and at school, where a fight spoils the preparations for the Thanksgiving pageant.

Nine-year-old Josefina, the youngest of four sisters living in New Mexico in 1824, tries to help run the household after her mother dies.

Molly is eager to meet a famous movie star at a War Bond rally, until she cannot find the money that her class had collected to buy a bond. Includes information on movies during World War II and a recipe for popcorn.

In 1934, during the Depression, Kit's cantankerous uncle comes to live in the Cincinnati boardinghouse run by her parents, enlisting her aid in transcribing his complaining letters to the editor of the local newspaper and inspiring her to write a different kind of letter of her own.

On a visit to Cincinnati from rural Kentucky during the Great Depression, Aunt Millie impresses Kit with her money-saving cleverness. Includes information on life in America during the Great Depression.

Tired of doing chores and longing for adventure during the Great Depression, Kit meets a hobo and decides to hop a freight train.

Molly is sure that she will find the surprise at the end of the overnight nature hike at Camp Gowonagin, but then she finds her own secret surprise.