The Picture History of Great Explorers

Gr. 2-4. Beginning with the first prehistoric explorers and moving through recent explorations of space, this short introduction covers a wide variety of figures. Some names are well known: Leif Eriksson, Francis Drake, and Thor Heyerdahl. But many lesser-known explorers are introduced as well. William Jansz found trading opportunities for the Dutch East India Company in the 1600s, and Hugh Clapperton explored Africa in the early nineteenth century. The two to three paragraphs of information per subject are probably insufficient for school reports, and the few maps do not provide enough assistance for pupils. But this highly visual book (with an illustrated time line running along the bottom of the page) will attract browsers, and it is rare to find a book so comprehensive in terms of the men (and a few women) who wanted to see what was around the next bend. A glossary is appended. Linda Perkins
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