When the Harry Potter series was born in 1997, most students at St. Francis High School couldn’t even read yet; however, throughout these 13 years, we’ve grown up together.

The final movie broke midnight box office records July 15, raking in 43.5 million.  Now, it is time to look back on the Harry Potter franchise and what has made it so amazing to its millions of loyal fans. The final movie “The Deathly Hallows”, based on book 7 of the Harry Potter series, had to be split into two parts the production team wanted to include as much as possible.

“It deals with everything that adults have to go through, but it still has a childlike theme of magic in it,” said senior KT Perleberg.

The Harry Potter book series is among the world’s most popular series of literature. According to author J.K. Rowling’s website, the books have been translated into 69 languages and distributed in over 200 territories. The series has sold over 400 millions books worldwide. On the website, Rowling lists 13 awards for the books, including Author of the Year and Lifetime Achievement Awards from British Books Awards.

“It has so many things it can teach you,” said Perleberg, “like being brave, being true to the people you love, and just doing the right thing in the end…like deciding between doing what is right and what is easy.”

Rowling’s novels center around a young wizard’s adventures (Harry Potter)  from age 11 to 17 while attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. While certainly magic plays a big part, there are many aspects within the series that appeal to all ages. The book even deals with issues or racism, slavery and prejudice. One could even determine the main villain (Voldemort) to be Hitler-esque, as his main goal is to kill those who are not pure blood witches and wizards. As Harry and his friends matured through the series, the fans who started reading the book have grown up as well.

“A character that I can relate to emotionally the most has got to be Hermione,” said Perleberg. “She doesn’t really worry about the kinds of things most girls worry about.”

Many creations have spawned from the imagination of Harry Potter’s many admirers.  There is a full blown fan-made musical called A Very Potter Musical available to watch in its entirety on Youtube.  The sequel, A Very Potter Sequel, was completed and released this summer. If musicals aren’t your forte, you can always check out Potter Puppet Pals, also on YouTube, which is a combination of jokes and pure silliness, including a a mysterious ticking noise and a naked Dumbledore puppet.

Brenda Gegan, a second grade teacher at St. Francis Elementary, annually reads the first four books to her classes. They also watch the first movie in the series. Ever since the first book was released, she has considered Harry Potter a very good way for kids to get started on literature at a young age. Many of the children she read the book to when they were in second grade were among those teenagers who attended the midnight showing of the latest movie.

 “Harry shows you how to choose good friends,” said Gegan “make important decisions, take risks, and triumph over evil.”