40 Fun Facts About The Mouse and the Motorcycle

In The Mouse and the Motorcycle, how does Keith teach Ralph to make the toy motorcycle actually run?

Making an engine noise is the trick Keith shares, the way any child powers a toy by sound. Once Ralph tries it, the little bike zooms across the hotel carpet.

What does Keith use to make a crash helmet for Ralph in Beverly Cleary's The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Half a ping-pong ball becomes the helmet, lined with thistledown and held on by a rubber band strap. Keith builds it because he wants his new friend to ride safely.

With the motorcycle missing in The Mouse and the Motorcycle, which other toy of Keith's does Ralph drive instead?

An ambulance is the fitting choice, since Ralph's errand is fetching medicine for a feverish Keith. He needs wheels to haul a tablet he cannot carry up the stairs by himself.

Offered anything he likes for breakfast in The Mouse and the Motorcycle, what does Ralph ask Keith to bring?

A peanut butter sandwich is Ralph's request, a feast for a mouse raised on crumbs that hotel guests drop. Keith keeps the whole mouse family fed from his own meals.

Which machine nearly swallows Ralph when a maid cleans under Keith's bed in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

A vacuum cleaner catches Ralph by the tail, and he saves himself by clinging to the motorcycle. He then pits the bike against its suction and loses control of it.

Which medicine does Ralph search the hotel for when Keith falls ill one night in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Aspirin is what Keith needs, but the hotel has none and the stores are shut until morning. The hunt is risky for Ralph, whose father died after carrying one of the tablets in his mouth.

On his first try at riding Keith's toy in The Mouse and the Motorcycle, Ralph tumbles off a table into what?

A wastebasket with metal sides holds Ralph prisoner, since he cannot climb out. He dreads being emptied into the hotel incinerator with the trash, until Keith comes back and finds him.

When his family checks out in The Mouse and the Motorcycle, what does Keith do with his toy motorcycle?

Keith gives it to Ralph to keep, a thank-you after the mouse risked his life to help him get well. Ralph promises his mother he will always ride it responsibly.

What is the name of the run-down California hotel where Ralph lives in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Mountain View Inn was once a fancy resort but has grown shabby by the time the story begins. Matt has worked there so long that he sorts guests into those who find it dreadful and those who find it quaint.

Whose play with toy cars and a miniature motorcycle helped inspire Beverly Cleary to write The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Her son was recovering from a fever when he played with his miniature cars and motorcycles. A neighbor supplied the rest of the idea by showing Cleary a small mouse caught in a bucket.

What color is the toy motorcycle with chrome exhaust pipes that Ralph longs to ride in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Red paint and gleaming chrome pipes make the little bike irresistible the moment Keith unpacks it. Ralph forgets all about hunting for crumbs and creeps out of hiding for a closer look.

Under his deal with Keith in The Mouse and the Motorcycle, when is Ralph allowed to ride the motorcycle?

Only at night is the bike Ralph's; by day the boy plays with it himself. Keith leaves his door ajar so the mouse can slip out and speed along the hallway.

What sudden sound startles Ralph into riding off the edge of a bedside table in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

A ringing telephone on the same table sends Ralph and the bike over the edge. He had reached the tabletop in the first place by scrambling up the phone's own wire.

Why does Ralph turn down Keith's invitation to come home with him in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

He'd live in a cage if he went, and Ralph decides that is too high a price for seeing the world. He stays on where he is, with plenty left to explore.

How does Ralph get Keith's toy vehicle down to the ground floor and back up in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

The elevator is Ralph's answer to stairs he cannot manage: he slips in behind a guest taking a dog outside, rides down unnoticed and returns the same way.

What job does Matt, the old man who can also talk with Ralph, do in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Bellboy Matt carries the family's bags upstairs and turns out to be a rare grown-up who understands Ralph. He keeps the secret and even lets the mouse back into Keith's room.

From which home state do Keith and his parents drive for five days to California in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Ohio is home for the family, who pull in worn out after the long trip. Keith's mother wants to look for a newer place, but his father refuses to drive another mile in California traffic.

Ralph's family in The Mouse and the Motorcycle lives behind what kind of opening in a hotel-room wall?

A knothole in the pine wall beneath the window is the mouse family's front door. Ralph's nervous mother is forever urging her children to stay safely behind it.

In The Mouse and the Motorcycle, Ralph is carried to the hotel laundry tangled inside which piece of linen?

A pillowcase swallows Ralph and the bike when he crashes into a heap of bedding. The maid carries the bundle away and drops it into a hamper without noticing her passengers.

In The Mouse and the Motorcycle, what job do the two guests who catch Ralph under a drinking glass hold?

Teachers staying down the hall catch Ralph and talk about taking him home as a classroom pet. He ends up dropped out of the window instead and has to find his own way back inside.

Over which holiday weekend do Keith and his parents stay at the old hotel in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Fourth of July traffic is the reason the family stops: Keith's father would rather wait out the holiday than keep driving. Keith gets a room all to himself, next door to his parents.

Which kind of small dog barks at Ralph from a nearby room in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

A terrier staying down the hall barks at Ralph, so the mouse learns to steer clear of its door. Later he drives past noisily on purpose, to wake the man who looks after it.

What is the last name of Keith, the boy who befriends Ralph in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Gridley is the family name: Keith travels with Mr. and Mrs. Gridley, who take the room next door. His mother worries from the start that such an old place must have mice.

After a maid dumps him in a laundry hamper in The Mouse and the Motorcycle, how does Ralph get out?

Ralph chews his way out through layer after layer of sheets, but he must abandon the bike because motorcycle-sized holes take too long. The holes later tell the housekeeper that the hotel has mice.

What does Ralph's mother call Keith's deliveries of food to the mouse hole in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Room service is her name for it when the treats turn up at the mouse hole. The feast draws every mouse relative in the building to a noisy family reunion.

Besides humans, which bird does Ralph have to dodge while searching for Keith's pill in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

An owl is one more danger Ralph must dodge, along with wakeful guests, as he hunts through the hotel. The search takes him all the way down to the ground floor.

In which mountain range does Beverly Cleary set the old resort hotel of The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Sierra Nevada foothills in California are the setting, a range named outright in the sequel Runaway Ralph. The third book places the hotel near an old gold-rush town called Cucaracha.

Whom does Ralph's mother want to send for Keith's pill in Ralph's place in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Uncle Lester is her pick for the dangerous errand, but he balks at the idea. Ralph insists he is old enough to do the job himself and sets off alone.

Which relative of Ralph's stops to stare as he rides past her in the hall in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Aunt Sissy is scurrying along the baseboard near midnight when Ralph waves at her and nearly loses control. He rides on feeling sorry for an aunt who has only her feet to carry her.

What do Ralph's relatives fear the hotel will use against them once it discovers mice in The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Traps and poison are what the mice expect once the staff knows about them. Ralph's plan is for everyone to lie low and live on food from Keith until the fuss dies down.

What job did Beverly Cleary, author of The Mouse and the Motorcycle, hold before she became a full-time writer?

Children's librarian was Cleary's first career, in Yakima, Washington. Her young patrons struggled to find books about characters like themselves, which pushed her to write her own.

Beverly Cleary wrote about Ralph the mouse years after her first book, which starred which boy with a dog named Ribsy?

Henry Huggins came out in 1950, fifteen years before the mouse book. Cleary wrote it after young readers kept asking her for stories about kids like themselves.

Beverly Cleary, author of The Mouse and the Motorcycle, grew up in which state, home of her Klickitat Street stories?

Oregon shaped most of her fiction: Cleary was born in McMinnville and raised in Portland, where a sculpture garden now honors her characters. Ralph's California hotel was a departure.

Which longtime Beverly Cleary collaborator drew the original illustrations for The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Louis Darling illustrated most of Cleary's books from 1950 until his death in 1970. The sequel Runaway Ralph was the last of them, and she dedicated it to him.

In Beverly Cleary's sequel Runaway Ralph, where does Ralph the mouse end up after he leaves home?

A summer camp called Happy Acres is where Ralph lands, only to be caught by a troubled boy named Garf and kept as a pet. He soon misses the family he ran away from.

In Ralph S. Mouse, Beverly Cleary's third mouse novel, which toy vehicle does Ryan's classmate Brad give Ralph?

A sports car is Brad's present to Ralph once the two boys patch up a classroom quarrel. Ralph soon has his relatives lining up in an orderly way for rides.

The 1986 TV film of The Mouse and the Motorcycle first aired as a Weekend Special on which network?

ABC ran its Weekend Special series on Saturday mornings for twenty years, adapting stories to encourage young viewers to read. Both Ralph sequels were filmed for it as well.

How was Ralph brought to life beside live actors in the 1986 TV film of The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

Stop-motion animation let a model mouse share the screen with human actors. John Matthews, a specialist in the frame-by-frame technique, handled Ralph's scenes.

Which prestigious honor went to the 1986 TV film of Beverly Cleary's The Mouse and the Motorcycle?

A Peabody Award went to the film as a rare children's program told with compassion, humor and a sense of wonder. Its director, Ron Underwood, had until then worked mainly in educational films.

In Beverly Cleary's Runaway Ralph, what kind of animal is Chum, the annoying neighbor Ralph is stuck beside?

A hamster named Chum is Ralph's unwelcome companion after a boy captures him and keeps him as a pet. Ralph has to strike a bargain with the boy before he can get home again.