Readers will be introduced to Robert L. Johnson. They'll find out how his charisma, determination, and sharp business skills helped him earn a Master's degree from Princeton University, found one of the biggest television networks in the world, and become driving forces of the entertainment industry.
Roberto Clemente was the first Hispanic American elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame. Readers will learn how he used his courage and determination during the off-season to help those living in poverty in Latin America.
From the impoverished inner-city streets of Milwaukee to her own nationally syndicated talk show in Chicago, Oprah has persevered to become one of the most recognized personalities in the world. Readers will learn how her courage, kindness, and perseverance have led her to found Oprah's Angel Network, a charity whose mission is to help the underprivileged of the world.
Discover how Larry Page and Sergey Brin started out as two ordinary computer science graduate students at Stanford University, but together, created Google, the world's most powerful information search engine on the Internet. Readers will learn about the power of innovation, creativity and tech smarts.
Bono and the band U2 have delighted audiences worldwide for more than 20 years. Readers will learn about Bono's rise to pop stardom and how he continues to use his talent and charisma to help third world countries fight diseases such as AIDS and Malaria.
Discover how entrepreneur Bill Gates created Microsoft and amassed a fortune as a leader in the computer industry and then partnered with his wife Melinda Gates to found the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Readers will learn about their lives and their mission is to enhance healthcare and reduce extreme poverty around the world.
Readers will be introduced to Andrew Carnegie and his rise from impoverished immigrant to one of the world's wealthiest industrialists. Learn how this self-made master of the American steel industry put his leadership, determination, and wealth to good use by building libraries, schools, and universities that continue to benefit people today.
Madam C. J. Walker's business skills, motivation, and determination helped her to develop a hair product and become the first African American woman millionaire. Readers will learn how those same skills also helped her reach out and help people living in poverty and speak out against injustice.
Ellen Ochoa's has a passion for engineering, space, and science. Readers will find out how Ochoa used this passion to earn a doctorate from Stanford and become the first Hispanic American female in space. Learn how she uses this passion to inspire students of all ages to work hard in school and follow their dreams.
It's bad enough being the new kid, but as a freshman, Jimmy finds school less enjoyable than many of his classmates. Standing 5'5" and weighing 187 pounds, he's subjected to a daily barrage of taunts and torments. His only sources of comfort are his family, his youth group, and his favorite foods. When his English teacher assigns a journal as a writing project, Jimmy chronicles not only his struggles but also his aspirations - to lose weight and win the girl of his dreams. Inspired by a true story and told in first-person journal entries, The Fat Boy Chronicles brings to life the pain and isolation felt by many overweight teenagers as they try to find their way in a world obsessed with outward beauty.
From the moment Simon Whitfield burst onto the world stage at the 2000 Sydney Summer Games as triathlon's first Olympic champion, his winning personality and stellar athletic abilities have inspired young people around the globe. In Simon Says Gold, Simon describes his personal journey to Olympic glory as he recounts not only that glorious day in Sydney, but also the anguish of failing to repeat as Olympic champion in Athens in 2004, and his dramatic comeback at the 2008 Beijing Games, when his exhilarating race to a silver medal enthralled millions of fans around the world. Simon's stories of the highs and lows of his running career will captivate readers young and old, but his real message that the simple pursuit of excellence is its own reward will also inspire and motivate. Not everyone can be an Olympian. Simon Whitfield believes that true greatness is in performing to the best of one's ability. The reward is in the effort, not the outcome.
Warm illustrations convey the deep bond between an old man and his six cats while teaching the reader about the cycle of life.
When a young boy leaves his muffin beside a sleeping homeless man, a cycle of goodwill begins. Without a single written word, this book effectively teaches about helping, sharing, and caring.
American society in the 1800s had a rough edge to it. In a nation made up of people of diverse backgrounds and heritage, social controls needed to be strict and enforceable. The extreme economic inequality of Americas cities and the wide open moral code of the frontier led to a culture of crime and violence that still plagues our country. During the 1800s, professional police forces were established in cities, towns, and territories across the continent. On the frontier, justice was often swift and severe, with hanging judges making their reputations as representatives of the law in a lawless land. Long prison sentences in miserable conditions were the rule for criminals, and many a prisoner might have preferred the option of a quick execution. Before the reform of the legal system, which is an ongoing process, there was definitely a separate law, and a separate standard of penalties, for the rich and for the poor. The evolution of a humane penal system and a fairer protection of all citizens under the law is an important contribution of 1800s America to the modern world.
For most of the 1800s, children were considered small, unruly adults who needed to be strictly disciplined and put to useful work as soon as they were able. The very concept of childhood itself, as a carefree, innocent time, is a result of increasing economic stability and changing family roles in the 1800s. Before child welfare laws were enacted and compulsory education enforced, children made up an important part of the industrial and agricultural workforce in 1800s America. Toys and time for games and fun may have been a luxury, but kids will be kids, and the adults that loved them made sure their lives weren't all work and no play. The establishment of public schools, more humane working conditions, and expanding economic opportunities helped improve the life of Americas children in the 1800s, but they worked hard and their pleasures were simple ones.
In rough frontier cabins, tidy farmhouses, and elegant townhouses, Americans in the 1800s were dedicated to living as well and as comfortably as their circumstances allowed. The American home was a sacred institution, the seat of family life where the patriarch ruled with Mother at his side as guardian of the home, and the children were raised with strict discipline and strong values. Changes in taste and fashion, improvements in technology (indoor plumbing and a host of new laborsaving devices), and social change transformed home and family life in the 1800s, as opportunities for leisure activities and commercially produced consumer goods came within reach of the average American. But the strong American tradition of the sanctity of the home, consumerism, and the importance of a happy family life has its roots in the homes of nineteenth century Americans.
While often behind the scenes and hidden from history, women in 1800s America worked side by side with men in building our nation. On the frontier, strong, capable women worked as hard or harder than their menfolk, taming the land and raising the crops while shouldering the responsibilities of keeping house and caring for the children. The life of the farm wife in the settled parts of the country was one of sunup to sundown labor in an era with few modern conveniences. And in urban areas, working class women were a major part of the workforce in an industrializing economy, while middle and upper class women influenced America's social movements, supported charities, and helped beautify the gritty cities. In the course of the 1800s, new labor saving technologies in the home, improved health conditions, greater economic and educational opportunities, and a growing sense of their rights helped to empower women and started the movement toward full equality with men that continues to this day.
The farmers, workers, and pioneers of America in the 1800s were nourished by a tradition of hearty, down home cooking that is still a part of our national cuisine - New England baked beans, roast beef, turkey, corn on the cob, and pumpkin pies. With roots in the British Isles, and with important contributions from Native American food plants and cooking techniques, American food and drink quality and seasonal variety was vastly improved during the 1800s by new technologies in transportation, food storage, hygiene, and preservation, growing national and world markets, and not least the delicious ethnic cuisines of new immigrant groups. Hungry for innovation, quality, and economy, Americans in the 1800s became the best fed nation in the history of the world!
We're all here because of people who met and fell in love in the past! In the 1800s, most young men and women were bound by powerful traditions of family, church, and society that limited their choices in romance and marriage. As an economic and community-building institution, marriage options were traditionally controlled by the older generation. Marriages were often arranged by families, and the bride and groom's personal feelings for each other were much less important than they are today. But as in so many other ways, America was a new and more open society. Communities of people from different and diverse backgrounds were established in a new land, and young people came together in a freer, more open environment. Romantic love flourished in the America of the 1800s as it never had before, with a whole variety of courting and marriage customs, many of which we still cherish today.
Founded on the principles of religious freedom, America in the 1800s was fertile ground for the expansion of religious movements and all kinds of experiments in spiritual matters. Americans in the 1800s took their religion very seriously. Away from the authority of established churches, the American frontier from upstate New York to the wilds of the Utah territory was a hotbed of new, radical religion based on a personal experience of salvation, direct revelation, and enthusiastic, highly emotional gatherings at camp meetings. At the forefront of the movement to abolish slavery and women's rights, idealistic men and women in the more established Protestant churches heard a new social gospel from an educated and progressive clergy. Meanwhile, large numbers of Catholic immigrants and Jews from Central and Eastern Europe established their own religious institutions in a new land. The religious history of America in the 1800s is rich and diverse and highly influential in the social and political evolution of our country.
America's love of sports goes back a long way. Baseball, basketball, and football all came of age in America of the 1800s. While men like Abner Doubleday may not have invented these sports, they did much to popularize them as rules were officially standardized and national-level organizations were founded. Amateur (and, later, professional) teams sprang up in towns, factories, and schools across America and rooting for the home team built strong community bonds and stimulated (usually) friendly rivalries. From horse racing to boxing to competitive target shooting, Americans would watch, cheer for, and bet on just about any contest of strength and skill. The growing class of Americans with leisure and money to spare discovered tennis and golf and polo, and women for the first time participated in competitive sports. Long before the World Series and the Super Bowl, Americans were idolizing their favorite athletes, while they played and watched sports with enthusiasm.
With a six day workweek, long hours on the job, and the hard labor required to keep house, leisure time was precious in the 1800s. Without recorded music, radio, movies, TV, video games, or the Internet, Americans had to make their own fun, and most of it was simple and very low tech - singing around the family piano, visiting with neighbors, or picnicking in the woods. In the bigger towns and cities, theaters offered live, professional entertainment ranging from classic plays to raucous minstrel shows. In the smaller towns and rural areas, people waited anxiously for those few times a year when a traveling show or circus might come through the area. As the 1800s progressed, leisure time and economic resources increased for many Americans and a more sophisticated public demanded new and more exciting amusements. Read all about America at play in the 1800s!
America in the 1800s was a very hardworking society. Early in the century, farmers, craftsmen, and housewives worked very much the way they had for centuries - by their own physical labor and the sweat of their brow. The growing industrial economy brought millions of workers, people leaving their farms and new immigrants, into the factories and workshops of America, where the work was hard, the hours were long, and the pay was low. Women and children made up a large percentage of the industrial workforce, and conditions were often miserable and dangerous. Meanwhile, a small class of industrialists built vast fortunes. As the century progressed, improved technology, workers rights legislation, and the rise of trade unions helped to alleviate some of the misery of American workers, but for much of the 1800s, the lives of an average working class person was one of hard toil, limited opportunities, and the constant threat of poverty.
With the principles of democracy firmly established after the War for Independence, Americans in the 1800s took their politics very seriously. As more and more male citizens gained the right to vote, elections became very public, hotly contested, and sometimes even violent. In the cities and towns of America, politicians courted political power and influence among new immigrant communities; buying votes and stuffing ballot boxes was shockingly common. While the major national political issues of foreign policy, taxation, the abolition of slavery, and states rights took center stage in Congress, Americans split along regional and party lines that still exist in the twenty-first century. Scandals over greed and corruption caused whole city governments to fall, but America also produced some of the greatest statesman and political leaders in its history. Former slaves, poor immigrants, and women demanded their right to vote.
