William Monson, Columbus Lions Club, Columbus, MN

This is our fourth or fifth year of donating the dictionaries to the third grade students in Columbus Elementary. The third grade teachers use these dictionaries throughout the year. We tell the students about the first dictionary that was written by Noah Webster in 1783 that was referred to as the Blue Backed Speller because of the color of the cover of the book. When Noah was 43 years old he began writing the first American Dictionary because Americans in different parts of the country spelled, pronounced and used words differently. He thought that all Americans should speak the same way. When he finished in 1828 at the age of 70, Noah’s dictionary had 70,000 words in it. This information comes from The Noah Webster House, Museum of West Hartford History. This is a terrific project, we believe the students will be able to learn a lot from these dictionaries.