Award-winning author Don Brown explores the history of electricity in
this installment of the Big Ideas That Changed the World series
In 600 BCE, the Greek mathematician Thales observed a seemingly strange
phenomenon: amber, when rubbed with a cloth, had the ability to attract
lightweight objects like feathers, straw, and leaves. He had unknowingly
discovered an electric charge. His experiments wouldn't be picked back
up until about 2,000 years later, when another curious mind, inspired by
the Greek word for amber (elektron), declared the rubbed object to
have an invisible power: electricity. From phones to light bulbs, from
wind and solar energy to electric cars, electricity is something we
can't live without today.
Narrated by Jagadish Chandra Bose, a Bengali pioneer in radio
technology, All Charged Up! is the fascinating story of both tireless
experimentation and accidental discovery, of inspiring human progress
and dramatic scientific rivalries. Full of facts and colorful historical
figures, this nonfiction graphic novel highlights key inventors and
breakthroughs, through the earliest discoveries to the Age of
Electricity to today, including: Musschenbroek's Leyden Jar, which
proved that electricity could be stored; founding father Benjamin
Franklin's famous experiment using a kite as a lightning rod (don't try
this at home!); a fierce competition between two Italian scientists that
resulted in the first battery (and inspired Mary Shelley's
Frankenstein); and Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison's War of the
Currents; and many more. Breaking down concepts like atoms, current,
electromagnetism in a kid-friendly, accessible way, acclaimed
author-illustrator Don Brown demonstrates how our world became plugged
in and connected by electricity.
Big Ideas That Changed the World is a graphic novel series that
celebrates the hard-won succession of ideas that ultimately changed the
world. Humor, drama, and art unite to tell the story of events,
discoveries, and ingenuity over time that led humans to come up with a
big idea and then make it come true.
