At a time when women were expected to be domestic angels, this spunky history tracks a handful of female risk-takers who dared to do what they loved despite the danger. Cummins profiles 14 women ranging in age from 15 to 63 who, between 1880 and 1929, performed death-defying acts guaranteed to generate thrills and chills and to challenge myths about the proper place of women. Rosa Richter performed as a human cannonball; Annie Taylor survived Niagara Falls in a wooden barrel; Mlle. D’Zizi and Gertrude Breton flew through space on their bicycles; and blindfolded May Wirth perfected a double backward somersault from one galloping horse to another. Mable Stark won raves as a tiger tamer. Gladys Roy and Gladys Ingle danced on biplane wings. Sonora Carver dove 60 feet into a water tank on the back of a horse. Cummins tells the stories of these and other female daredevils with panache, sensitive to their roles as the “extreme sport” reality-show stars of the day. Harness’s action-packed illustrations show each female daredevil performing in period costume and setting. Kudos for bringing to light this hidden slice of female history. (introduction, chronology, sources) (Nonfiction. 8-11)
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-525-47948-2
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2007
Partly filling the historical gap between their New Americans: Colonial Times, 1620-1689 (1998) and A More Perfect Union: The Story of Our Constitution (1987), the Maestros examine King William’s War, Queen Anne’s War, the War of Jenkins’ Ear, and other half-forgotten conflicts usually lumped together as the French and Indian Wars. Concluding that these wars were fought for economic control of North America and paralleled the first stirrings of a sense of national unity, the authors trace the growth of trade routes and other lines of communication. They also pay close attention to the wars’ consistently lamentable effects on the Native American groups allied with either the French or the British forces. Though much of the fighting and strategic maneuvering took place in what is now Canada, the Maestros take their most widely angled views of territories that became part of the United States. With plenty of precisely drafted battle scenes, street plans, portraits, maps, and landscapes, plus a spread of additional information on topics as diverse as colonial money and the Iroquois League, they bring a formative era in our country’s history into sharp focus for young readers. (index) (Nonfiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: Aug. 31, 2000
ISBN: 0-688-13450-5
Page Count: 48
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2000
The chef of Philadelphia’s City Tavern—a modern replica of a Revolutionary War–era public house frequented by many of the Founding Fathers—serves up a bland broth of historical highlights, from the Tavern’s opening in 1773 and its role as the First Continental Congress’s “main hangout” to a grand pre-inauguration fête given to George Washington in 1789. The local angle gives this quick overview of our country’s first years of independence some value, but the territory has been thoroughly scouted already, and the narrative is constructed more from broad generalizations and doubtful claims (considering the state of food storage in the 18th century, it’s unlikely that the tavern served “stews and meat pies from England” for instance) than colorful particulars. Juarez plants plenty of familiar faces into his period scenes of (rather decorous) revelry, but he also strains for child appeal by adding a shiny-eyed mouse in a tricorn hat as a sort of tour guide/commentator. Most disappointingly, there’s not much about food here, though a closing recipe for “Old-Fashioned Corn Bread” helps to remedy the lack. Needs more flavor. (Informational picture book. 8-10)
Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-7624-3598-2
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Running Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 29, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2010
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