Biography

Anything But Ordinary Addie: The True Story of Adelaide Herrmann Queen of Magic written by Mara Rockliff, illustrated by Iacopo Bruno

~ Janet Dawson ~ 2 Comments

Published by Candlewick

Summary: Adele Scarsez never wanted to be ordinary. As a young woman she tried dancing and acrobatics, but they didn’t quite satisfy her desire to entertain and thrill audiences. Traveling to America, she met a young magician named Alexander Herrmann and asked him to marry her. He agreed, and Addie found her true calling as Adelaide Herrmann, magician. She performed as his assistant for many years. When he died, she knew she needed a way to keep the show going. Addie decided to learn the bullet-catching trick, a bit of magic so dangerous that magicians had been killed performing it. However, Addie succeeded, and her show continued for many years. An author’s note at the end tells a bit more about Addie, as well as how Mara Rockliff uncovered her story. 48 pages; grades 1-4.

Pros: The team that produced last year’s Mesmerized returns with another tour de force. The story is fascinating, and the illustrations and overall design of the book, with text in a variety of fonts woven in among the pictures, make this a visual feast.

Cons: I would have liked to have understood the bullet-catching trick while reading the story instead of having to go to the website given on the last page to get a description of what it was.

Clean Sweep! Frank Zamboni’s Ice Machine by Monica Kulling, illustrated by Renne Benoit

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Published by Tundra Books

 

Summary:  Anyone who’s ever gone ice skating, or watched a sports event that took place on ice, has observed the giant Zamboni machine that drives around the rink and quickly resurfaces the ice.  But 70 years ago, there was no machine, and it took several men 90 minutes or more for that ice treatment.  And for Frank Zamboni, owner of the Iceland rink in California, that was too many man hours.  Fortunately, Frank was a tinkerer who knew a lot about machinery.  He had come up with an innovative way to design Iceland that resulted in smoother ice than other rinks.  Nine years passed, as Frank got busy raising a family and was shut down from working on his machine during World War II.  Many people said what he was trying to do was impossible, but he persevered.  In 1949, his machine took to the ice, and did in minutes what had previously taken over an hour.  Frank named his new machine after himself, which is good, because it’s so much fun to say “Zamboni”.  Today, Zamboni machines are on every continent…except the ice-covered continent of Antarctica.  32 pages; grades K-4.

Pros:  The story of an ordinary man who saw a problem, persevered, and succeeded in solving it.  This would be a great book to include in a unit on inventors and inventions.

Cons:  The poem at the beginning about ice skating is cute but seems sort of unnecessary.

Fearless Flyer: Ruth Law and Her Flying Machine by Heather Lang, illustrated by Raul Colon

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Published by Calkins Creek

 

Summary:  Ruth Law loved to entertain crowds with her daredevil flying, but after four years of shows, she was ready for a new challenge.  In 1916, she decided to fly from Chicago to New York City, which would set a new American record for nonstop flight.  Although she had never flown more than 25 miles, Ruth was a mechanical whiz, and set about modifying her plane to get it ready for the journey.  She also cut a map into strips and put it on a roller.  She had to have both hands on the controls at all times, but managed to maneuver one control with her knee when she had to turn the roller and find her way.  (Kind of like those drivers who talk on their phones with one hand and hold their Slurpees in the other)  Flying in a 50-mile-per-hour late November wind, she made it as far as Haskell, NY before she ran out of gas.  That was enough for a new record, though, and the next day she landed in New York City, gliding past the Statue of Liberty before landing in the midst of a cheering crowd.  Grades 1-4.

Pros:  Heather Lang tells a fascinating story of an early aviation pioneer, with relevant quotes from Law interspersed throughout the text.  The illustrations capture the feel of flying in a primitive airplane, low enough to the ground to be able to navigate with a map.

Cons:  This is mostly the story of a single flight, not a complete biography of Ruth Law.

Miss Mary Reporting: The True Story of Sportswriter Mary Garber by Sue Macy, illustrated by C. F. Payne

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Published by Simon and Schuster

 

Summary:  Mary Garber was considered a bit of a tomboy growing up in North Carolina.  She played tackle football on the boys’ team and loved going to football games with her father.  After college, she knew she wanted to be a reporter, but her first job on the society page didn’t exactly suit her.  During World War II, most sports writers went to war, so Mary got to fill in, a job she continued for the next forty years.  Not only did she blaze trails for women sportswriters, but she was among the first to report on African American teams and players, most famously Jackie Robinson.  If a kid tried hard, Miss Mary would report his or her achievements in a positive way, resulting in adults who sometimes thanked her for her coverage many years later.  As the author notes at the end, “Mary Garber didn’t set out to change the world, but change it she did.”  End matter includes author’s note, a timeline, and additional resources.  40 pages; grades 1-4.

Pros:  A lively biography of a little-known woman who followed her passion and opened doors for others as she went.  The slightly goofy illustrations lend a light-hearted feel to the text.

Cons:  Mary looks pretty much exactly the same in the illustrations from childhood through retirement.

Beatrix Potter & the Unfortunate Tale of a Borrowed Guinea Pig by Deborah Hopkinson, illustrated by Charlotte Voake

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Published by Schwartz & Wade Books

 

Summary:  Told as a story letter (“My Dear Reader”) in a style similar to one Beatrix Potter used to use, this tale features a young Beatrix.  Not surprisingly, she enjoyed keeping numerous pets, and even borrowing others’ pets, mostly for the purpose of drawing and painting them.  She could be careless, though, and on one occasion, she forgot about a borrowed guinea pig, who proceeded to eat up most of her art supplies.  Unfortunately, these proved fatal for the cute little animal, and Beatrix was forced to go confess her mistake.  In an attempt at compensation, Miss Potter offered a watercolor drawing of the guinea pig, which was not received too graciously.  Although the story is about a young girl, the author’s note reveals that this incident happened when Beatrix Potter was 26 years old.

Pros:  This humorous tale includes quite a bit of historical information about Beatrix Potter’s life and how she got her start writing and illustrating her famous books.  The watercolor illustrations are clearly inspired by the Potter books.

Cons:  The whole killing the guinea pig thing is a little less of a chuckle when one finds out it was committed by a 26-year-old woman.

 

Nice Work, Franklin! by Suzanne Tripp Jurmain, illustrations by Larry Day

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 Published by Dial Books for Young Readers 

Summary:  Some presidents have faced personal challenges, some have faced national challenges, and some, as the author describes on the first page, have faced both.  She then goes on to a light-hearted introduction to Franklin Roosevelt, and how he aspired to be like his famous cousin Theodore.  He got off to a good start—young Franklin was rich, smart, and determined.  He soon was making a name for himself in the New York legislature and as Assistant Secretary of the Navy.  But shortly after his 39th birthday, he was struck with polio and paralyzed from the waist down.  Although he never recovered use of his legs, he learned to stand with braces and went on to become NY governor, then President of the United States.  And there he was faced with a national challenge, the Great Depression.  Using the same determination that helped him overcome polio, he worked hard to improve Americans’ lives.  The book ends with Roosevelt’s second term inauguration.  An author’s note gives more information about Roosevelt’s life and some of the programs he started during the Great Depression.  32 pages; ages 6-10.

Pros: This is the third book of U.S. history by this author-illustrator team (George Did It and The Worst of Friends are their other two).  Although the subject matter is serious, both the text and the illustrations are upbeat and humorous.  While Franklin Roosevelt comes off in a positive light, there is some balance in describing why some Americans didn’t like him as President.

Cons:  The book begins when Roosevelt is a young man and ends in early 1937, so this is not a complete biography.

Solving the Puzzle Under the Sea: Marie Tharp Maps the Ocean Floor by Robert Burleigh, illustrate by Raul Colon

~ Janet Dawson ~ 1 Comment

Published by Simon and Schuster 

Summary: Marie Tharp fell in love with maps when she and her family moved from place to place for her father’s job. After attending 17 different schools, she studied geography in college, then got a job at Lamont Geological Laboratory at Columbia University.  Looking for a groundbreaking project to work on, she teamed up with her colleague Bruce Heezen to map the ocean floor.  For 20 years, from 1957 to 1977, Heezen collected data on many ocean trips, and Tharp turned the data into maps.  Along the way, she discovered a deep rift in the Atlantic Ocean which helped support the theory of continental drift.  Her maps have been used in schools and museums around the world.  End matter includes more information about Marie Tharp, a glossary and bibliography, and a page entitled, “Things to Wonder About and Do”.  40 pages; grades K-4.

Pros: The first person narration imbues the story with Marie’s own energy and enthusiasm. Colon’s illustrations beautifully capture the light and colors of the seas and the intricacies of Tharp’s maps.

Cons:  The continents are moving an inch or two every year?!

Ada Byron Lovelace and the Thinking Machine by Laurie Wallmark, illustrated by April Chu

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Published by Creston Books

Summary:  From the time Ada Byron was a child, she loved the world of science and, especially, math.  She designed a flying machine at the age of 12, shortly before becoming very ill with a case of the measles that left her temporarily blind and paralyzed.  She persevered with her education, however, and when she was 17, she met Charles Babbage, a mathematician and inventor who had created a mechanical calculating machine.  He had also designed, but not built, an Analytical Engine, which was a more sophisticated machine, the forerunner of a computer.  Ada studied his designs for this machine, and created a numerical algorithm that would instruct it.  Although Babbage never built his machine, Ada’s algorithm is considered to be the first computer program.  Back matter includes an author’s note, timeline, and bibliography.

Pros: An inspiring story of a brilliant girl growing up in a time when such brilliance was not generally recognized and nurtured. Chu’s illustrations evoke the early 19th-century feel of Ada’s time in history.

Cons:  The pages describing the young Ada’s design of a flying machine, followed by her bout with measles, seemed a little disjointed and confusing to me.

Voice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer: Spirit of the Civil Rights Movement by Carole Boston Weatherford, illustrated by Ekua Holmes

~ Janet Dawson ~ 1 Comment

Published by Candlewick 

Summary:  Fannie Lou Hamer’s story is told in her own poetic voice, illustrated with collage renderings of events throughout her life.  Born in the Mississippi delta, the youngest of 20 children, Fannie Lou had to drop out of school after sixth grade to work in the cotton fields.  She married Perry Hamer and adopted two daughters after being tricked into having an operation to prevent her from being able to have children.  In 1962, she attended her first voter registration meeting, unaware that blacks even had the right to vote.  Within the year she was deeply involved in the Civil Rights Movement, losing her job and her home as a result.  Imprisoned and badly beaten, she refused to give up her work, eventually becoming a national spokesperson for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and addressing the 1964 Democratic National Convention about voter discrimination.  Fannie Lou also worked to improve conditions in Mississippi, organizing cotton pickers and starting a Head Start program.  She died in 1977.  An author’s note, timeline, and bibliography are included.  56 pages; grades 5-8.

 

Pros:  A powerful story about a poor, uneducated woman who was able to make a difference on a national level.  The poetic text perfectly captures Hamer’s voice, and is complemented by the large, colorful illustrations.

 

Cons:  There’s a lot of information here, and even older students may need some historical context to understand all of Hamer’s contributions.

Sewing Stories: Harriet Powers’ Journey from Slave to Artist by Barbara Herkert, illustrated by Vanessa Brantley-Newton

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Published by Alfred A. Knopf 

Summary:  Harriet Powers was born into slavery in Athens, Georgia.  She grew up on a cotton plantation, watching women spin, dye, and weave cloth.  She participated in quilting bees, where slave women were given a few hours to sew their own creations instead of having to follow directions of the mistress of the house.  At one of those bees, she met the man who would become her husband.  They married and had five children; when the children were still young, the family received word of the Emancipation Proclamation and were free.  Harriet and her husband worked hard and saved enough money to buy a small farm.  When the price of cotton dropped, Harriet was forced to sell two of her beautiful story quilts.  One of them was purchased by an art teacher who wrote down the stories pictured in the different quilt panels.  An author’s note explains that those two quilts still exist today, in the National Museum of American History in Washington, DC and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.  Other back matter includes a bibliography, photos of the two quilts with a list of the stories portrayed on each, and the only known photograph of Harriet in existence.  40 pages; grades K-3.

Pros:  The beautiful quilts are evidence that art can flourish in any environment.  The illustrations capture Harriet’s spirit as well as her works of art.

Cons:  I hesitate to enter into the controversy over the depiction of slavery in A Fine Dessert, but two of the criticisms I have seen—that the portrayal of a slave girl living with her mother is unrealistic, and that the slave girl shouldn’t be pictured with a smile—are present in this book as well.  So far, I’m not aware of similar criticisms for Sewing Stories.