The Newsies from Storyworks

Who are the “newsies” in the play?

• kids who sell newspapers

• men who own newspaper companies

• drivers who deliver newspapers

• managers who hand out newspapers

Which words best describe the newsies at the beginning of the play?

• thoughtless and unfair

• important and powerful

• educated and successful

• poor and often homeless

In the sentence “But these papers will sell like hotcakes,” what does sell like hotcakes mean?

• sell best in the morning

• sell mainly to hungry people

• sell quickly and in large numbers

• sell slowly because they’re outdated

In Scene 3, why do people stop buying newspapers?

• The war ends.

• Prices increase

• People are busy

• The newsies go on strike

Why do the newsies go on strike?

• to sell more papers

• to fight unfair costs

• to find more workers

• to charge more for papers

Which line from the play best supports the correct answer to the question about why the newsies went on strike?

• “People don’t care when the big news is a cat up a tree.”

• “Rose and Boots enter a room packed with newsies.”

• “We’ll force the newspaper owners to lower our price back to 50 cents.”

• “They throw papers over the side of the bridge.”

At the end of the play, what does William Randolph Hearst tell the newsies he’ll do?

• send them all back to school

• lower the cost of newspapers

• buy back papers they don’t sell

• give their jobs to someone else

What does the Epilogue tell about?

• why newsies needed jobs

• what happened after the strike

• life before TV and cell phones

• how people used to sell papers

How do you imagine the newsies felt while they were on strike? Do you think they all felt the same?

How did the strike change things for the newsies? How did it help change things for other people?