Gene Barretta: 5 books

What do record players, batteries, and movie cameras have in common? All these devices were created by the man known as The Wizard of Menlo Park: Thomas Edison. Edison is most famous for inventing the incandescent lightbulb, but at his landmark laboratories in Menlo Park & West Orange,...

A picture book about homonyms starring a silly cast of animal athletes. What is a homonym? It's a word that has different meanings but is always spelled the same. This informative book, set at a sporting event, includes a BAT who can BAT! A karate-chopping bulldog who is tough enough to BREAK...

An introduction to Leonardo da Vinci's genius focusing on his famous notebook sketches and the modern inventions they predicted. In 1781, Thomas Paine came up with a model for a single-span bridge; in 1887, Adolf Eugen Fick made the first pair of contact lenses; and in 1907, Paul Cornu built...

President Abraham Lincoln grew up in a one-room log cabin. President John F. Kennedy was raised in the lap of luxury. One was a Republican and one a Democrat. They lived and served a hundred years apart. Yet they had a number of things in common. Some were coincidental: having seven letters...

The inventions and inspiration of Benjamin Franklin and how they've stood the test of time What would you do if you lived in a community without a library, hospital, post office, or fire department? If you were Benjamin Franklin, you'd set up these organizations yourself. Franklin also designed...