A.A. Davenport

Author Bio

History, retold from ground level, with feathers

A.A. Davenport writes history by changing the camera angle. Instead of generals on horseback or inventors at a lectern, the view drops to the yard, the wagon bed, the back steps of a cabin. A chicken is present, not as a punchline, but as a steady witness: small, practical, alert to crumbs and danger. The result is a run of books that treats the past as something lived day to day, cooked, carried, rebuilt, and endured. The recurring phrase “A Chicken Was There” works like a refrain, funny on first contact, then oddly persuasive. Of course a chicken was there. Chickens travel with people, showing up in colonies, on trails, in wartime, and at winter celebrations.

The shape of the series

Read together, the books form a sideways timeline. Each volume picks a wide historical frame and filters it through one premise: that ordinary creatures, and households, are part of every grand story. If you’re looking for A Chicken Was There series in order, the titles suggest a path. A Chicken Was There Too: Tales of the Colonial Chickens Who Were There at the Birth of America plants its feet early. A Chicken Was There: Tales of the Pioneer Chickens Who Helped Settle the Great American West shifts to movement and the logistics of survival. A Chicken Was There Also: Tales of the Courageous Chickens Who Were There Through the Civil War and the Rebuilding of America widens into conflict and aftermath, using “also” to underline persistence.

Other volumes open the lens. A Chicken Was There at Christmas: Throughout History and Around the World, When the Sun Rose on Christmas Morning, A Chicken Was There uses a holiday as a hinge: one date, many places, many mornings. And A Chicken Was There: Inventors, Explorers, and World Changers trades a period setting for a category of people, suggesting even mythologized figures can be approached from the side. For the full run, there’s also the A Chicken Was There series page.

Reading experience

These books work well for readers who like history when it’s allowed to be strange. A chicken is an inherently comic presence, but it also has a job: it eats, it lays, it survives. That tension between the silly image and the serious backdrop keeps the tone lively. The series is a gentle on-ramp for readers who don’t want to be lectured: the titles promise stories rather than arguments. If you’re assembling the A Chicken Was There series for a household reader, it’s easy to match a volume to a current interest: pioneers, the Civil War, Christmas, or inventors. The recurring line reminds you that the past wasn’t only made by speeches and signatures, but by chores, by meals, by the animals underfoot. A chicken was there. The sentence is simple. It keeps opening.

If you’re looking to buy A.A. Davenport books, you can find good low-cost copies on ThriftBooks.