At 9 and 10, one of my granddaughters had three wishes while visiting the Berkshires: The aquarium at the Berkshire Museum, the carousel and the Hot Dog Ranch. If you build it right, they will come.

Suddenly I have a horse — excuse me, a donkey — in the race, and I have started to care about the carousel. O’Hara writes at one point in his book of his dismay when he’s told that he and Missie are ...