Social Studies

When Ruth Bader was growing up in Brooklyn in the 1930s and 1040s, women were not encouraged to work outside the home or go to college. But Ruth loved to read and learn. She went to Cornell University, where men outnumbered women four to one. There she found her calling as a lawyer, a job where she felt she could make a difference in the world.

Back in the 1830s, who was a young blacksmith from Vermont, about to make his mark on American history? John Deere, that’s who!

Who moved to Illinois, where farmers were struggling to plow through the thick, rich soil they called gumbo? Who tinkered and tweaked and tested until he invented a steel plow that sliced into the prairie easy as you please?

Long before the first tractor, who changed farming forever? John Deere, that’s who!

Beautiful illustrations―including spectacular landscapes―reflect the time period and bring John Deere's remarkable story to life.

A century ago, the curious idea that spirits not only survive death but can be contacted on the “other side” was widespread. Psychic mediums led countless séances, claiming to connect the grieving with their lost relations through everything from frenzied trance writing to sticky expulsions of ectoplasm.

British explorer Percy Fawcett believed that hidden deep within the Amazon rainforest was an ancient city, lost for the ages. Most people didn’t even believe this city existed. But if Fawcett could find it, he would be rich and famous forever. This is the true story of one man’s thrilling, dangerous journey into the jungle, and what he found on his quest for the lost city of Z.