Oh, The Places He Went
A Story about Dr. Seuss
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Dr. Seuss is known as the creator of some of the most beloved children's books of all time. Journey to the fantastic world he created in this appealing story about the author/illustrator whose magical, rhyming characters have delighted children of all ages.
Mr. Blue Jeans
A Story about Levi Strauss
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
In 1847 an eighteen-year-old immigrant arrived in New York. He had little in his pockets and no knowledge of English. However, by 1874, people throughout the United States knew him as the man who made blue jeans with copper rivets. Even now Levi Strauss's name lives on as a mark of quality and style. In Mr. Blue Jeans, Maryann N. Weidt presents the history of this hardworking man, as he struggles through long, grueling days as a peddler and challenging times as a young businessman. His honesty, integrity, and generosity stand out as clearly as his name, making this rags-to-riches story well worth reading. The accurate and highly readable text is enriched by Lydia M. Anderson's dramatic black-and-white illustrations.
Mark T-W-A-I-N!
A Story about Samuel Clemens
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Samuel Clemens grew up in a child's paradise--Hannibal, Missouri. There, mischief added humor to everyday events as Sam encountered the folks who would one day reappear as Huck Finn, Aunt Polly, and Becky Thatcher in his books, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. At eighteen, Sam left Hannibal to seek his fortune. He became a newspaperman and story writer. Then, always a restless spirit, he tried his hand as a steamboat pilot (where he took a liking to the riverboat call "mark twain"), a soldier, and a gold prospector. All the while, Sam collected tales to tell on stage and recount in his many books. David Collins invites readers into the fabulously exciting, endlessly entertaining world of "America's Greatest Humorist"--the beloved Mark Twain.
The Road to Seneca Falls
A Story about Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
When Elizabeth Cady Stanton was a little girl in the early 1800's, she realized that most people seemed to think that boys were better than girls. As Stanton grew up, she saw that women had fewer opportunities than men. With this in mind, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and her longtime friend Lucretia Mott organized the nation's first women's rights convention, which took place in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848.
Musical Genius
A Story about Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
A musical prodigy, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart began playing the piano and composing when he was just three years old. Able to play multiple instruments, among them the piano and violin, Mozart spent much of his youth touring European courts with his family. From the time he was three until his death just thirty-two years later, he produced a huge volume of musical works. Among them the famed operas The Magic Flute, The Marriage of Figaro, and Don Giovanni.
Fighting for Equal Rights
A Story about Susan B. Anthony
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Born a Quaker, Susan B. Anthony grew up being taught that women were equal to men. During her lifetime, she was a teacher, a newspaperwoman, and an activist. She worked to further many causes such as the temperance, the abolitionist, and women's rights movements. Although she didn't live to see her dreams of women's suffrage come true, her tireless dedication to the cause was crucial to its success.
Seneca Chief, Army General
A Story about Ely Parker
by Elizabeth Van Steenwyk
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Ely Parker grew up on the Tonawanda Reservation in New York in the 1830s. There he learned the ways of his people, the Seneca Indians. Ely worked many years to save his reservation from a land company, and as a result, he was made a sachem, or chief, by his people. At the same time, he was working as a translator and ambassador to bridge the gap that divided his people from the white Americans. After serving in the Civil War, Ely went on to become a United States general and lead the agency in charge of Indian affairs. Author Elizabeth Van Steenwyk tells this inspiring, and surprising, story of a man who achieved amazing success in two very different worlds.
Tales for Hard Times
A Story about Charles Dickens
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
As a small boy, Charles Dickens worked in a dark, musty London warehouse, pasting labels onto pots of boot polish. He tried not to listen to his grumbling stomach or the rats squeaking on the stairs. His dream was to escape that misery one day and become a fine, educated gentleman. Through his gift for writing, that day did come for Dickens. But he never forgot what it was like to be poor. He wrote stories about London's lower classes--tales that made people laugh, cry, and work to improve their social conditions. By the time of his death, Charles Dickens had become one of the most popular English writers ever. Step into nineteenth-century London and the life of Charles Dickens in this exciting book. David R. Collins's exciting biography and David Mataya's powerful illustrations bring this master storyteller to life.
Jazz Age Poet
A Story about Langston Hughes
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
The author of such poems as I, To; Sing America; and The Negro Speaks of Rivers, Langston Hughes combined his experiences and emotions with the rhythms and themes he found in jazz music to create an exciting new style of poetry. Throughout his lifetime, Hughes won many awards and honors for his various books of poetry, novels, short stories, plays, children's books, autobiographies, and magazine articles. Despite always struggling to succeed financially, Hughes never gave up trying to be a better writer, and a better man.
Frontier Surgeons
A Story about the Mayo Brothers
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
In the 1870's, surgery was a crude affair performed on the patient's kitchen table. In the frontier town of Rochester, Minnesota, Dr. W. W. Mayo brought his young sons, Will and Charlie, to assist him with operations. Fifty years later, Rochester became a medical mecca as the Mayo brothers were established as world-class surgeons. With a firm belief in sharing information and learning from others, the Mayo brothers proved the benefits of cooperation in a jealously competitive field, and accomplished more than any single colleague of their time. Emily Crofford gives a vivid account of the Mayo's' meteoric rise to fame and their contributions as pioneers on the frontier of modern surgery.
Flying Against the Wind
A Story about Beryl Markham
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Born in England and raised in the bush of East Africa, Beryl Markham was an extraordinary child--and lived an extraordinary life. She learned how to train racehorses from her father and became the first woman to succeed in Kenya's competitive racing circuit. When an airplane came to Africa, Beryl learned to fly. After a few years of carrying mail and passengers, she decided to take on the Atlantic Ocean. As the first person to fly non-stop from England to North America, Beryl Markham proved that no matter what the challenge, she was not afraid to fly against the wind.
Stateswoman to the World
A Story about Eleanor Roosevelt
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Eleanor Roosevelt is perhaps best known for her role as First Lady, wife to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. But this strong-willed woman was a skilled politician in her own right, who overcame her own prejudices to fight for the rights of women, blacks and the poor. This inspiring biography tells of Eleanor Roosevelt's development from a lonely, orphaned teenager to a determined, socially conscious woman, beloved in the United States and throughout the world.
We'll Race You, Henry
A Story about Henry Ford
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Henry Ford loved mechanical things: springs and gears, cogs and wheels, and things that clicked and ticked and turned. One hot summer day in 1876, Henry and his father were riding to Detroit in their farm wagon. Suddenly there was a huffing-puffing monster heading straight toward them. It was a road-roller, and it was lumbering down the road all by itself. That was the day Henry started thinking about horseless riding machines--and he never stopped. In We'll Race You, Henry, young readers will discover the origins of one of the most popular cars of all time--the Model T--as well as the daring side of its inventor and the early days of automobile racing.
A World of Knowing
A Story about Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet had a sharp mind and a great determination to make a difference in the world. When Thomas met Alice Cogswell, a little girl who was deaf, he decided to go to Europe to study deaf education and became a teacher. The signs he learned developed into American Sign Language and helped his students to leave their isolation behind.
Dance of the Swan
A Story about Anna Pavlova
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Born in St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1881, Anna Pavlova grew up dreaming of becoming a prima ballerina. Throughout her lifetime, Anna inspired and encouraged people around the world with her exceptionally graceful and expressive dance. Believing that expressing beauty is essential to the human spirit, Anna strove to help audiences discover the soaring beauty that could uplift their spirits.
Liberty or Death
A Story about Patrick Henry
by Stephanie Sammartino McPherson
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
"Give me liberty, or give me death!" A passionate speaker, Patrick Henry mesmerized and motivated audiences with his powerful words. Henry believed that Britain had stolen America's freedom, and he was determined to prevent this injustice. Using his skills as a lawyer and politician, he inspired his fellow colonists to prepare for a war against Britain--and helped to create a new nation.
Revolutionary Poet
A Story about Phillis Wheatley
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Taken from her family in Africa at the age of seven, Phillis Wheatley arrived in Boston as a slave in 1761. After she was purchased by the Wheatley family, Phillis quickly learned to speak and read English. The bright young girl soon began writing poetry. By 1771, her poems had been published in newspapers all over the colonies, and critics were praising the "extraordinary negro poetess." In this engaging biography, author Maryann Weidt tells the story of how a young slave girl in revolutionary Boston became an internationally famous poet and the first black American to publish a book.
Pioneer Plowmaker
A Story about John Deere
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
In the 1800's, the moist soil of the Midwest would stick to plow blades, stopping the farmers as they plowed. Young blacksmith John Deere knew about the problem, so he designed and built a self-scouring plow. With this small start, he founded the famous farm implement company Deere & Company and started down the road to success.
I Have Not Yet Begun to Fight
A Story about John Paul Jones
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
The Father of the U.S. Navy, John Paul Jones spent most of his lifetime trying to prove his ideas about naval tactics and training. Born in Scotland, he chose a life of adventure as a sea captain. He commanded cargo ships before settling in America and becoming an officer in the newly formed Continental Navy. Through persistence, training, and sheer nerve, Jones fought against the formidable British Navy and helped America win its freedom.
Natural Writer
A Story about Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings dreamt of becoming a famous writer from the time that she was a young girl. After several years of searching for adventure and success, Marjorie finally found inspiration in the wild country of central Florida. While living there, she produced several popular works of fiction, including the Pulitzer Prize - winning novel The Yearling.
First Son and President
A Story about John Quincy Adams
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Americas sixth president and son of Americas second president, John Quincy Adams lived an extraordinary life. Beginning as a young boy as secretary for his father during the peace talks that ended the Revolutionary War, Adams served his country as a diplomat, state senator, secretary of state, the president, and as a representative in congress. Through his many speeches, essays, books, and written reports, Adams helped shape America. Today, he is remembered as a great statesman, a scholar, and a poet, just as he hoped he would be.
The Country Artist
A Story about Beatrix Potter
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Tea with a hedgehog and supper with a rabbit? Beatrix Potter entertained guests that most people--certainly Beatrix Potter's proper Victorian parents--would have thought belonged in a meadow, not in a London nursery. Such unlikely companions were company for lonely Beatrix, and she spent much of her time sketching and making up stories about these small creatures. Beatrix was so well acquainted with the characters of her various animal friends that when she was older it seemed natural to write and illustrate small books about their delightful adventures. Generations of children all over the world have gotten to know and love Beatrix Potter's animal friends--Benjamin Bunny, Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle, Squirrel Nutkin, Peter Rabbit, and many more. David Collins's lively text and Karen Ritz's striking illustrations combine to tell the wonderful tale of this gentle, creative woman who had a special feeling not only for animals, but also for children.
A Pocketful of Goobers
A Story about George Washington Carver
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
There wasn't anything that George Washington Carver couldn't grow. He took the common goober--today's peanut--and created hundreds of useful products from it, turning goobers into a very profitable staple for the South. At the same time, this very special man passed on to everyone who knew him the importance of following one's own dreams.
Raggin'
A Story about Scott Joplin
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Scott Joplin came from a music-making family in Texarkana, Texas. As a small boy, he loved the lively, rhythmic African melodies and the soft, touching spirituals that he heard his father sing. By the age of twenty, Joplin had left home to make a living as a musician. Barbara Mitchell's Raggin' is the story of this talented composer/musician who overcame prejudice and hardship to create such favorites as "Maple Leaf Rag" and "The Entertainer"--music that still makes people tap their toes.
Go Free or Die
A Story about Harriet Tubman
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
For the first twenty-eight years of her life. Harriet Tubman lived as a slave on a southern plantation. Finally, with the help of a Quaker woman, she was able to escape to Philadelphia by way of the Underground Railroad. After her escape, Harriet began her quest to help free other slaves. Over a ten-year period she led more than three hundred people through the Underground Railroad. In Go Free or Die, young readers will learn about this courageous woman who refused to be a slave and who fought for freedom for everyone.
Discovering Nature's Laws
A Story about Isaac Newton
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Sir Isaac Newton changed the world with his many discoveries and inventions about mathematics, science, optics, and physics. Although he was brilliant, Newton felt no need to publish his ideas or to inform his fellow scientists of the amazing discoveries he made. Because of this, his discoveries were often disputed. Despite the controversy that often surrounded him, Newton made astounding advances in his efforts to understand how nature worked. His legacy lives on through inventions such as microscopes, eyeglasses, telescopes, and cameras.
Beyond Little Women
A Story about Louisa May Alcott
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
More than a century after Louisa May Alcott wrote them, classics such as Little Women, Little Men, and Jo's Boys continue to be read and treasured by readers around the world. Alcott began writing as a young girl and dreamed of becoming a rich and famous author. Despite supporting her entire family with the proceeds from her writings, she was able to achieve her dreams and became one of the best-known and admired writers of her time.
Rooftop Astronomer
A Story about Maria Mitchell
by Stephanie Sammartino McPherson
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
It was a clear autumn night in 1847. Maria Mitchell stood on the roof of her parents' house on the island of Nantucket, focusing her telescope on a faraway star. Suddenly she realized that the faint, blurry light wasn't a star at all-it was a comet! Maria Mitchell's discovery changed her life. She became famous as the first acknowledged woman astronomer in the United States. During her many travels, Maria came to realize that most women did not have the same opportunities as men. She thought that women should be encouraged to be anything they wanted to be. This was a lesson she taught her students as an astronomy professor at Vassar College and a message she stressed as the president of the Association for the Advancement of Women. From the rooftops of Nantucket to the great observatories of Europe, Stephanie Sammartino McPherson skillfully chronicles the life of this outstanding woman.
Say It With Music
A Story about Irving Berlin
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
As a boy, Israel Baline had to work after school to help his poor immigrant family. He sold newspapers on street corners to help his family survive. He loved to sing to pass the time, and sometimes listeners tossed an extra penny or two at his feet. No one who heard him could have guessed that he would someday become known as Irving Berlin, the best-loved songwriter in the land. The composer of "God Bless America," "White Christmas," and many other well-known tunes began his musical career on the streets and in the seedy cafes of New York City's Lower East Side. Author Tom Streissguth tells Berlin's remarkable story in lively prose that captures the spirit of the long-gone days of ragtime, vaudeville, and Broadway glory.
Civil Rights Pioneer
A Story about Mary Church Terrell
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Mary Church Terrell grew up after the Civil War with many opportunities. Although she received an excellent education and had a distinguished teaching career, Mary grew up African American in a segregated country. There were opportunities she did not have. Always determined, she joined the fight for equal rights. By lecturing, picketing, and writing she made her voice be heard and helped to end segregation.
A Fairy-Tale Life
A Story about Hans Christian Anderson
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Young Hans Christian knew how life should be--just like a fairy tale. But, while he was growing up in Odense, Denmark, his life didn't seem much like a fairy tale. Although everyone was telling him to stop daydreaming and find a job in a trade, he found fame writing fairy tales like "The Little Mermaid," "Princess on the Pea," and "The Emperor's New Clothes." A Fairy-Tale Life tells the story of Hands Christian Andersen, the world's best-loved teller of tales.
The Back of Beyond
A Story about Lewis and Clark
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
In 1803, Meriwether Lewis was offered the chance of a lifetime. The president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson, asked him to lead an expedition across North America, through the Louisiana Territory and Oregon Country to the Pacific Ocean. Lewis jumped at the opportunity and called on his friend William Clark to share in the command of the exploration. The two men organized a small unit of volunteers they called the Corps of Discovery. They had little idea of what dangers lay ahead in the mysterious lands. Would they be attacked by wild animals? Could they survive winter's harsh weather? On May 21, 1804, the Lewis and Clark expedition embarked on one of the greatest adventures of all time. they would change the country forever, as they traveled into the Back of Beyond.
The Wizard of Sound
A Story about Thomas Edison
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
In 1877 a young man developed a way to reproduce sounds so they could be heard again and again. This young man, Thomas Edison, has since been heralded as one of the world's greatest inventors. This inspiring biography details the creation of Edison's favorite invention, the phonograph. Young readers will also discover that Edison did not allow his handicap (he was hard of hearing) to slow him down.
A Hunger for Learning
A Story about Booker T. Washington
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
When nine-year-old Booker T. Washington was finally freed from slavery, he soon discovered that freedom had a price, and that he had to work, and work hard, to make his way in the world. After years of study and struggle, Washington became a teacher at what would become the famed Tuskegee Institute. Built from the ground up by Washington, his students, and his staff, Tuskegee became one of the finest schools for black students in the nation. More than one hundred years later, it still is.
Remember the Ladies
A Story about Abigail Adams
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Abigail Adams lived through the Revolutionary War and became the First Lady of the second president of the United States. Though women of her time could not vote, govern, or own property, Abigail believed that women should not be ruled by laws they did not make. Although she did not see these rights come to women, she never gave up talking, writing, and perhaps most important, believing that women were equal to men. Her courage and strength enabled her to help her husband create a new country. She never fired a gun, but her pen was a weapon that helped win freedom for her country--and herself.
Uncommon Revolutionary
A Story about Thomas Paine
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Thomas Paine believed that American liberty was not only possible but worth dying for. He was dissatisfied with his quiet life until he traveled to the American colonies. There, the cause of American freedom from English rule lit a fire within him. To inspire colonists to support and fight the war, he wrote Common Sense and The American Crisis. He was the first person to use the term the United States of America in print. He helped transform an entire nation with the power of his words.
Freedom Seeker
A Story about William Penn
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
The son of a wealthy, repected admiral, William Penn did what was forbidden in seventeenth-century England--he openly practiced the Quaker religion. Penn dreamed of a place with freedom of religion. He asked for land in the New World and was given a colony called Pennsylvania. His success in establishing a new and just government there later became the blueprint for thirteen newly independent colonies.
Click!
A Story about George Eastman
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
When George Eastman decided to make photography his hobby, "simple" was hardly the word to describe the pastime. He had to lug 50 pounds of camera equipment around with him, including the fragile glass plates that would become pictures. But resourceful George wasn't one to put up with such inconvenience for long. Click! is the story of how George Eastman developed a camera simple enough for anyone to use-the Kodak, predecessor of today's pocket instamatics-and forever revolutionized photography.
Writer of the Plains
A Story about Willa Cather
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
From the time she was a young child, Willa Cather had a gift with words and she loved stories. As a child on the Nebraska prairie, she heard many stories from her neighbors, many of them immigrants, and she never forgot them. She begun to write stories of her own, and even after she became a successful journalist, she made time for them. Her great novels of the prairie, such as O Pioneers! and My Antonia, established her as one of the finest writers of all time. In Writer of the Plains, author Tom Streissguth paints a clear and interesting portrait of this complex and independent woman.
The Workers' Detective
A Story about Dr. Alice Hamilton
by Stephanie Sammartino McPherson
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Dr. Alice Hamilton's accomplishments were many, but one in particular changed her life forever. Working as a social worker in the Chicago slums, Alice noticed that lead factory workers were pale and thin, and some had trouble moving their wrists and hands. Setting out to investigate the cause of their ailments, Alice pioneered a new branch of medicine--industrial medicine. As a doctor, social worker, and fighter for peace, Alice single-handedly changed the world. Because of her many American workers lived longer, healthier lives.
Writing for Freedom
A Story about Lydia Maria Child
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Lydia Maria Child grew up in the 1800s reading countless books. She defied the idea that girls weren't supposed to fill their minds with ideas and stories. They weren't supposed to write their own books, either, but that is exactly what Lydia Maria did. Although she gained remarkable success as a writer for children and adults, she sacrificed everything when she took up her pen against slavery. Lydia Maria believed that slavery was wrong--and she wasn't afraid to say so. As a result, her courageous words changed her life and helped change the course of American history.
Walking the Road to Freedom
A Story about Sojourner Truth
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Sojourner Truth was born into slavery in New York in 1797 or 1798. She never knew for sure which year she was born or even whether it was summer or winter. By the time she was a young woman, Sojourner knew she could no longer live as a slave, and with the help of Quakers, she escaped to freedom. She then began her long struggle to reunite her family and to free other slaves.
The Play's the Thing
A Story about William Shakespeare
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
The year was 1569 and the place was Stratford-on-Avon. A little boy watched a company of traveling actors perform on a makeshift stage. No one could have known that the child, whose name was William Shakespeare, would one day become the most famous playwright in history. This is the story of the man who wrote Hamlet, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, and many other plays that have been performed and enjoyed again and again for more than four hundred years.
To The Point
A Story about E. B. White
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
E. B. White first recognized the magic in words when he was very young. As a child, some of his happiest hours were spent finding just the right words to describe his feelings and experiences. After graduating from college, he took a job with a new magazine called The New Yorker. The magazine's readers soon began to look forward to the poetry and essays written by E. B. White. His writing was clear and lively with no wasted words, and it could make people laugh as easily as it could make them cry. In 1936, White and his family moved to a little farm near the coast of Maine, complete with sheep, chickens, and pigs. It was there that E. B. White wrote Charlotte's Web, perhaps one of the most beloved children's books ever written.
Sisters Against Slavery
A Story about Sarah and Angelina Grimké
by Stephanie Sammartino McPherson
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Sisters against Slavery recounts the lives of Sarah Grimke and Angelica Grimke Weld. These daughters of wealthy Southern planters and slave owners renounced slavery in the 1830's. Through their writings and through a series of lectures delivered in the North, the sisters became famous for their views on slavery and women's rights. Although the sisters were active as speakers and essayists for a relatively short time in the 1830's and 1840's, they reached tens of thousands of people, influenced American views on slavery, and were an inspiration to women's rights leaders for decades to come.
President of the Underground Railroad
A Story about Levi Coffin
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Growing up in a Quaker family in the South in 1830, Levi Coffin did not support slavery, but he was exposed to its atrocities. Convinced that every person deserved to be free, Levi began helping slaves escape to the North along the Underground Railroad, and during the following 40 years he was able to help over 3,000 people find freedom.
Healing Warrior
A Story about Sister Elizabeth Kenny
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
In 1942, polio epidemics raged out of control, and medical treatments were largely unsuccessful in fighting the disease. When Elizabeth Kenny, a self-taught nurse, boldly declared she had found an effective treatment, the desperate public took notice. The medical community, however, considered her a quack. After countless battles for recognition, Sister Kenny's results proved her right, and Kenny's methods were used to save thousands world-wide from life-long paralysis. From Elizabeth Kenny's childhood in the Australian bushlands to her triumph against polio and skeptics, biographer Emily Crofford skillfully brings this memorable character to life.
A Head Full of Notions
A Story about Robert Fulton
Part of the Creative Minds Biography series
Robert Fulton was an American inventor born in 1765. Some of his accomplishments include designing some of the first submarines and designing the first commercially successful steamboat, the Clemont.