In 1932, Kit finds she has hard lessons to learn about the Depression, both at home, where she is helping her mother run a boardinghouse while her father looks for a new job, and at school, where a fight spoils preparations for the Thanksgiving pageant.

Samantha discovers the delights of turn-of-the-century New York City when she travels there with her grandmother.

At the approach of the Revolutionary War, Felicity is torn between support for a tea boycott and her friendship with Elizabeth, a loyalist from England.

Molly finds her life full of changes while her father is away fighting in World War II.

Molly's excitement at performing in a big show is exceeded by the announcement that her father is returning home from World War II.

The outbreak of the Revolutionary War in 1775 brings changes to Felicity's life in Williamsburg.

Nine-year-old Josefina, the youngest of four sisters living in New Mexico in 1824, tries to help run the household after her mother's death.

While spending the summer at her grandmother's, Samantha and her cousins decide to visit the island where Samantha's parents were drowned during a storm.

Josefina and her sisters distrust learning to read and write, as well as other changes their Tia Dolores is bringing to the household, because they fear they will lose their memories of their mother.

After being orphaned, Nellie and her two younger sisters find hope when Samantha's family in New York City wants to adopt the girls, but when Uncle Mike shows up and threatens to ruin it all, Nellie must find a way to keep her promise to her dying mother without losing her new family.