From a Vermont Humanities Press Release
Each year since 2003, Vermont Humanities has invited students, adults, and seniors across the state to read the same book and participate in a wide variety of community activities related to the book’s themes.
Weybridge, Vermont, in February 1807 is small, cold, lonely, and beautiful. As an unwed woman with few prospects, Sylvia Drake resides with and cares for her sister’s rambunctious family. But today the house is abuzz awaiting a guest – Charity Bryant.
So opens the graphic novel Charity and Sylvia by Tillie Walden, the award-winning, Vermont-based cartoonist and author of Spinning and On a Sunbeam.
Created from archival materials at the Henry Sheldon Museum of Vermont History in Middlebury, Charity and Sylvia is a groundbreaking biography that is also the story of 19th-century America.
In 2024, Vermont Humanities appointed Walden their first “cartoonist in residence” and commissioned her to research a graphic novel based on Charity and Sylvia’s story. The goal was for the story to reach a wider audience, and to be accessible to the many middle and high schools who take part in Vermont Reads. You can read more about the project and download a PDF excerpt of the book here.
Listen to the Vermont Reads 2026: Charity and Sylvia Podcast
Vermont Humanities just released a 28-minute podcast episode featuring people involved in the creation of Charity and Sylvia.
The episode features a deep dive on the history and significance of the book with author Tillie Walden and others, including:
Coco Moseley, Executive Director of the Henry Sheldon Museum of Vermont History
Allison Cardon, the Public History Fellow at the Sheldon Museum
Meg Tamulonis, Manager of Collections and Exhibitions at the Fleming Museum at the University of Vermont, and the volunteer curator of the Vermont Queer Archives
Christopher Kaufman Ilstrup, Executive Director of Vermont Humanities
You can listen to the episode on their website or on their YouTube channel (shown below)