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I. Bibliographic Information

1. Title Will You Sign Here John Hancock

2. Author Jean Fritz

3. Illustrator Trina Schart Hyman

4. Publisher Scholastic INC.

5. Place of Publication New York

6. Copyright Date 1976

Historical non-fiction, Biography
 * II. Genre** (type of literature)

If you knew John Hancock how would you, describe him; nice, rich, generous, you could say all of those but since you don’t know him that’s too bad. The author Jean Fritz and the illustrator Trina Schart Hyman might even say the same thing too. He is a rich, snobby man that thinks he is the best and he never messes up. Whenever there are guests around he always tries to look good but when he messes up he always tries to cover it up. Actually, in his life __**a lot**__ of things go wrong. Since John always is popular it gets him into a friendship with John and Samuel Adams. Samuel Adams liked John Hancock and they practically became best friends.
 * III.** **Characters/Intro:**

The plot of a story includes both the **setting** and the **important events** that occur in your story. The change of setting and the events happening along the way control the flow of a story from beginning to end.
 * IV. Plot:**
 * __Make a list of important events and their settings for each part of the story__**. Use words that will appeal to our five senses and that will give us a strong image of the setting. **//Remember that setting includes time and place//**.

__BEGINNING -__ In the beginning of the story when John was always been dreaming of being famous and popular. When John is 2 his uncle dies he has been left with the fortune of his uncle. After all that passes over, John dreams is preceding; he dresses the best and has the best looking shirts on. Most people liked him until the king of England starts the stamp act John says he would never pay a penny. The years pass and one year a ship brings very good news, the king has took of taxes! With all the delight everybody is happy and the host, John Hancock sets off a huge party that has more than you can imagine! But no one knows that next year the news is very bad. The king puts a second stamp act on the colonies! After, a tense wave of anger is with England and the colonies, it is obvious that a war was about to start. Some people even put pictures of him with donkey ears. This makes John madder than ever he has more enemies. He must find a way to gain his better reputation during and out of the war.

__MIDDLE__ The war rages and soon he must escapee from the battles to a safer place.John Hancock as to escape from Lexington, and when he was safe, he couldn’t just go back to Lexington. And he was one of the delegates from Massachusetts, and he had to go to a meeting with representatives from all of the Colonies, to decide what to do about England. John Hancock then went to Philadelphia for the meeting. There he collected a lot of huzza’s. Meanwhile, people started to look around fro a presindent for Continential Congress. And who didm they pick, of course.John Hancock. John became president of the Continental Congress (which is not the president of the U.S.A). He focused a lot on his signatures. Also, all the members of the Congress wondered if they should declare their independence. Some said ‘Yes, now’, some said ‘No, not yet’. But on July 2nd they said they should declare. It was prepared by Thomas Jefferson. And when it was written john Hancock signed first, with giant swish’s and swirls. Then he said ‘There. King George can read that without his glasses.’ If America won the war, he would be honored as first Signer, if America lost, he would be hanged first.John had been waiting to fight in a battleeand collect thousands of huzzas, nithing goes as planned. He was so sure he would fight in the battle that he rearranged his face. But John Adams nominated George Washington 1st and Samuel. when that happens John messes up very badlyand just packs up and leaves.

__END__ John fights in a battle, and he gets very wet and cold. He houses 120 French officers for many weeks. John becomes governor 11 times and buys many new, glorious things he wished to be vice president but John Adams won. He had two children and sadly they both died, one from when he was tring on new ice skates the other only lived a few months. He became very sick with leg and head aches, even at the quietest noise he would yell and be raged with anger. He died in October, 1793.

In the book Will You Sign Here John Hancock? I did not find many connections because I am not a snobby rich boy, like John Hancock who was always giving gifts to people, but I try to be nice too like him. I did find the book interesting and there were a lot of different topics in little sections. My first connection is my biggest, in the beginning of the story when John is under a lot of pressure from the stamp act from the king of England. My parents for a while were arguing about taxes because they paid it a little late. They argued for a very long time and there was a lot of frustration. Just like John, except they probably weren’t as stressed. I thought the parts when John was always trying to look good and the parts when John had to do with non fancy things and he couldn’t live in as much comfort were all even. It’s even because if you saw a rich man and he was the second richest man in America you would probably think he would always live in huge room with squeaky clean floor; I did. But John in times did not live in huge fancy rooms; he probably lived in a middle class room or even lower at times. John also is like me because when I was little I always wanted to help people except not for popularity, John Hancock did it for attention and popularity. But all this leads to my favorite pages in the book.
 * V.** **Connections**


 * VI. Read-Aloud Part**

__Page:__ 31, 33, 34

__First line of passage:__ 1# For much of the war John lived in comfort. 2# But for all the attention that John Hancock received presiding over Congress, he always imagined that he would receive more attention fighting battles. 3# Major General John Hancock of the Massachusetts Militia.

__Why?__ I like these passages because it tells you when John Hancock messes up the most. Also it describes that he always wants to be perfect. At one time he has to use tiny spoons until some one took pity and gave him a big spoon, one night he needed to borrow 2 blankets because he was to cold. He had to go through the hardships that no one would want go through, and he even said that himself.