In Across Five Aprils, how is Jethro a typical boy?

begins the story as a nine-year old boy on his first day planting in the fields. This new position in the family gives him the honor of graduating to the adult table during meals. He is youthful and full of ideas and thoughts of a young mind. As the story progresses over the five seasons of the American Civil War, his responsibilities increase to that of a grown man. As his brothers leave to fight in the war, he is left with the plowing, planting and harvesting of not only the family farm, but his brothers as well. When his father has a heart attack, he is the sole man of the family looking out for the welfare of his mother, father, sister, sister-in-law and two nephews, as well as the farm and livestock.