Two Little Trains

Two-time Caldecott Medalists Leo and Diane Dillon team up with Margaret Wise Brown in Two Little Trains, first published in 1949. Right from the cover, the sleek, horizontal illustrations chronicle the parallel journeys of the titular trains: a toy train wrapped in a gift box waits on the platform next to a massive modern train. ""One little train was a streamlined train,/ Puff, Puff, Puff to the West./ One little train was a little old train,/ Chug, Chug, Chug going West."" In one spread, the trains look down at the ""deep dark river."" The streamlined train races across a purple bridge while, opposite, the toy train crawls along the edge of a bathtub, the purple soap and tub basin connecting the tub scene to that of the locomotive. ( May)