Each year, thousands of students on field trips to Lowell bring with them a knowledge of Lowell’s industrial history that they acquired by reading about fictional “mill girl” Lyddie Worthen, the main character of Katherine Paterson’s beloved novel Lyddie.  Paterson, the Library of Congress's 2010-2012 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, will talk about how historical research, a compelling plot, and a feisty female character combine to create a novel that breathes life into the story of Lowell’s nineteenth-century textile mills and the labor activism of “mill girls.” A 20^th Anniversary Series offering of the Tsongas Industrial History Center, a partnership of Lowell National Historical Park and the UMass Lowell Graduate School of Education.  This presentation is supported in part by the UMass Lowell Center for Arts and Ideas.