Secrets Underground: North America's Buried Past - Softcover

MacLeod, Elizabeth

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1554516307 ISBN 13: 9781554516308

Publisher: Annick Press, 2014

Synopsis

Uncover the spine-tingling mysteries and eerie surprises that lurk right under your feet! In Secrets Underground, history buff Elizabeth MacLeod takes readers deep down, below the earth’s surface, and introduces them to a completely different world sometimes terrifying, often baffling, and always fascinating. Discover: the Civil War secrets carefully concealed in Organ Cave, West Virginia the top-secret equipment that lies deep below Grand Central Terminal in New York City how the Aztec city Tenochtitlan, the largest and most powerful city of its time in what is now North America, nearly disappeared without a trace the abandoned ships buried beneath San Francisco that reveal the city’s history as a top destination for fortune seekers during the Gold Rush the nuclear shelter the U.S. government kept hidden for decades underneath an exclusive resort in West Virginia called The Greenbrier. Guiding readers through these fascinating places, MacLeod reveals their long-kept secrets and deftly explains how these lost and hidden subterranean passages, spaces, and caves answer decades-old puzzles, help us understand our own past, and lead us to discover what life was really like in eras gone by.

About this title

About the Author:

Elizabeth MacLeod is a prolific author of non-fiction books for children, including Bones Never Lie and the Red Maple Award-winning Royal Murder. She lives in Toronto.

From School Library Journal:

Gr 4–8—What mysteries are buried under our modern cities? How were those underground places used? This book attempts to look at North America's buried secrets from a historic point of view. Beginning with Mexico City's foundation on the Aztec city of Tenochtitá and moving chronologically across the rest of North America to include buried ships in San Francisco from the Gold Rush; a West Virginia cave used by Confederate soldiers during the Civil War; Prohibition-era underground tunnels of Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan; New York City's buried machinery during World War II; and a giant bunker in West Virginia used during the Cold War. Chapters open with a short narrative meant to hook readers and then give a description of the underground structure and its historical significance. However, students may lose interest, as the historical background is a trifle circuitous and takes precedent, leaving little room for exploration of the subterranean areas. There are surprisingly few actual photos of the caves and tunnels, and what the book does have are small sized. The sidebars are filled with ancillary information that doesn't always enhance or complement the text. Readers who are drawn to historical mysteries may be disappointed.—Patricia Feriano, Our Lady of Mercy School, Potomac, MD

About this edition

• Publisher: Annick Press
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1554516307
• ISBN 13: 9781554516308
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 96