“Wake up, O Hindus, wake up! … Let us pick up rifles and become soldiers worthy of defending our country,” exhorted Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, a Brahmin Hindu yogi, poet, playwright, political prisoner, and founder of the secret... Read More

Imagine what might happen if Harry Potter and Nancy Drew joined forces to save the planet. Meet twins Abby and Derick Cragbridge, seventh-grade grandchildren of famed inventor Oscar Cragbridge, whose super-exclusive boarding school is no... Read More

“The impossibility of conceiving that this grand and wondrous universe, with our conscious selves, arose through chance, seems to me the chief argument for the existence of God,” said evolutionist Charles Darwin in a statement often... Read More

Bird watching is the fastest-growing outdoor activity in the United States. According to the US Fish and Wildlife Service, almost fifty-two million Americans report that they watch birds. But what do children raised on a glut of... Read More

“How noble and good everyone could be if, every evening before falling asleep, they were to recall to their minds the events of the whole day…” wrote Anne Frank, the quintessential young diarist. "Confessions of Joan the Tall", a... Read More

Originally from China, the zhi ji, or ring-necked pheasant, was named for the white feather “necklace” the male of the species wears. In 1908, neighboring farmers A.E. Cooper and E.L. Ebbert successfully introduced the birds into... Read More

More than ninety thousand fortune-seekers swarmed to California when gold was discovered at Sutter’s Fort in 1848. In order to reach San Francisco, half these gold seekers braved a grueling, eighteen-thousand-nautical-mile voyage... Read More

“Has either one of you ever written or illustrated a book without the help of the other?” inquired one interviewer of Maud and Miska Petersham. “We couldn’t do that,” replied the couple in unison. That response captures the... Read More