L. Frank Baum

Chicago, April, 1900.



THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ


1. The Cyclone


Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with
Uncle Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer's
wife. Their house was small, for the lumber to build it had to be
carried by wagon many miles. There were four walls, a floor and a
roof, which made one room; and this room contained a rusty looking
cookstove, a cupboard for the dishes, a table, three or four
chairs, and the beds. Uncle Henry and Aunt Em had a big bed in
one corner, and Dorothy a little bed in another corner. There was
no garret at all, and no cellar--except a small hole dug in the
ground, called a cyclone cellar, where the family could go in case
one of those great whirlwinds arose, mighty enough to crush any
building in its path. It was reached by a trap door in the middle
of the floor, from which a ladder led down into the small, dark hole.

When Dorothy stood in the doorway and looked around, she could
see nothing but the great gray prairie on every side. Not a tree
nor a house broke the broad sweep of flat country that reached to