1. Pet Contest

Calendar Mysteries July Jitters By Ron Roy

Chapter 1 Pet Contest "Can you guess who I am?" Mr. Vooray asked the students in his first-grade class. He was wearing a white wig with a ponytail tied with a ribbon. On top of the wig sat a hat with three corners. He wore short pants, showing long white socks. Shiny buckles decorated the tops of his shoes. "Elvis Presley?" Nate Hathaway asked. Mr. Vooray shook his head. "I'm a king, but not the king of rock and roll," he said, grinning.

"Anyone else have a guess?" "King Tut?" Brian Pinto said. Everyone laughed. "Wrong period of history," Mr. Vooray said. "And King Tut was nine years old when he became king. Do I look that young?" It was the last day of school, and warm in the classroom. Because of snow days, school was letting out late this year. A fan sat on Mr. Vooray's desk, but it didn't do much good. The windows were open, but there was no breeze. "Give us a hint!" one boy called out. "Okay, I will," said Mr. Vooray. He pulled a stack of play money off the math shelf. He handed it to Bradley Pinto, who sat in the first row. "Pass it out, and make sure everyone gets some, Bradley." Bradley walked down the rows, giving play paper money to all the kids. "Does everyone have money?" Mr. Vooray asked when Bradley was back in his seat. "But it's fake!" Brian Pinto said. "We can't buy anything with it."

"Pretend," Mr. Vooray said. Then he pulled a box of prizes off the game shelf. "Lucy, do you want to come up here and buy something with your money?" Lucy Armstrong walked to the front of the class. She looked in the box. "Can I buy those stickers?" she asked. "Certainly," Mr. Vooray said. "That will be one dollar, please." Lucy handed him a fake dollar. "And ten dollars tax, please," Mr. Vooray added. "Ten dollars tax!" Lucy said. "That's a lot!" "Do you want the stickers, Lucy?" Mr. Vooray asked. "I guess so," Lucy said. She gave him ten more dollars and took the stickers back to her seat. "You got robbed!" Nate told her.

"Has anyone guessed which king I am?" asked Mr. Vooray. "King Robber!" Brian said, and everyone laughed again. "I am King George the Third," Mr. Vooray said. "Who's he?" Nate asked. "He ruled Great Britain back in the 1700s," Mr. Vooray explained. "That included the American colonies. A lot of the king's subjects didn't think

he was a very good king. For one thing, he taxed them way too much, just like I taxed Lucy too much. Even though the people in the colonies paid high taxes, they didn't have anyone to represent them in the British government. They had made a new life for themselves. They had built homes, worked on farms, and started families. But even from far away, King George still tried to rule them." "How could he do that?" Lucy asked. "He was a very powerful king," Mr. Vooray said. "He had lots of money, ships, and men who could cross the ocean and keep an eye on the colonists. Finally, the colonists had had enough of King George. They decided to break away from his power. In 1776, they asked Thomas Jefferson to write a paper explaining why it was a good idea to declare independence from King George. We call this paper the Declaration of Independence." "Hey, I saw that!" Scott yelled out. "It's in Washington, D.C. Right, Mr. Vooray?" "Yes, but the original is quite faded and almost impossible to read," the teacher said. "Remember,