Let Kiernan Shipka Read You a Story to Kick Off Women’s History Month

March 1, 2017

Yahoo.com | By Raechal Leone Shewfelt

Kiernan Shipka, the 17-year-old actress known for playing Sally Draper on Mad Men, knows a good story when she reads it. On Tuesday, she shared a special one to mark the beginning of Women’s History Month.

Shipka read The House That Jane Built, a children’s book about turn-of-the-century activist and philanthropist Jane Addams, on camera as part of Storyline Online, a program of SAG-AFTRA Foundation meant to encourage reading to children. The story, written by Tanya Lee Stone and illustrated by Kathryn Brown, recounts the life of Addams, the first woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize for creating the country’s first settlement house – Chicago’s Hull House – in 1889.

At the house, thousands of working-class people found day-care services, an employment bureau, and courses in subjects such as art and English. Addams and the other women of Hull House went on to fight for the rights of immigrants and women. Addams died in 1935 at age 74.

Shipka will return to TV on March 5 in the new FX series Feud: Bette and Joan, but in the video, she gives the impression that she spends a lot of her off time in the library.

“Reading is magical for so many reasons,” Shipka said at the end of the book. “It can bring you to amazing, magical places that are beyond your wildest dreams, but it can also give you amazing, valuable, and inspiring information.”

“I’m so happy this book exists, and I got to learn a little more about Jane,” she added. “She makes me want to be a better person.”

Yeah — Don and Betty Draper weren’t always the best inspiration for that.