I'd heard of Jim Thorpe. I'd heard of the Carlisle Indian School and the prowess of its sports teams. I can't say that I'd ever heard the connection between the two. This book is more about Thorpe than about the school. Coulson gets a lot of credit for not whitewashing the reality of the Indian schools or systemic racism, even for a young audience. The reality is softened; Coulson discusses the cruelty of taking children far from their families and stripping them of their culture but doesn't go into rampant abuse and neglect. Readers are told that the schools were "sometimes cruel" rather than truly criminal. The focus is certainly more on the early days of organized sports. Pair this book with something on the history of football.