This is one perspective http://www.tolerance.org/article/teaching-huck-finn-without-regret Granted, I think he was teaching in the mid-90’s.
Despite being a gal, I have never read Little Women. All the middle school girls loved it and I was contrary. But I insisted my girls read Pride and Prejudice. Put me in the group that adores it, for the spunk and the romance. (Spunk got me with HF, too. And, Catcher in the Rye.)
At a young age, I was reading plenty that was bleak, but My Antonia…I don’t know if I could read it again.
The point of whitewashing the fence (Tom Sawyer) was how he manipulated. An early life lesson in “spin.” 
I’m sure many know that World History is now much more multi-cultural than when we were in school, no longer just the western world.