The Remarkable Benjamin Franklin Paperback – September 23, 2008

The ultimate American citizen...Ben Franklin! A successful businessman from rags to riches with a keen scientific mind, a true patriot, a founding father of our country and the institutions that make it successful: fire departments, hospitals, libraries, post offices...he started them all! One need only to look around the world today - at other war torn nations - to be thankful for leaders like Ben who established our country on a successful course.Harnesses' rich illustrations will take you on a whirlwind journey through Ben's life - from a humble New England boyhood to the parlor's of France. Her lively storytelling frames all the details and her expressive illustrations brings Ben's world to life! Children and adults will marvel at Ben's accomplishments and savor all the details in Harnesses' story as she describes all the high points.If you want to get your children hooked on history, Harness will draw you in!

New as advertised, undamaged in mail. Thank you!

Good information, great illustrations.

I teach 4th grade and this is a great read-aloud during our literacy time as we study the American Revolution. We were able to do a vocabulary study and character, actions, traits chart by using this book. I would highly recommend for a 4th grade teacher!

Received my book today, wonderful history book with great pictures.

We have a school project on the American Revolution and my son was lucky enough to get Ben Franklin as his person to research. I've read quite a few books for 9-12 years old on Ben Franklin at this point. This one is one of the very best. Historically accurate without going into too much depth on some topics, interesting author insights, such as this quote, "He soon made one of the happiest discoveries any person can make: He and his work were a perfect fit." (p.6). I love how the author added both Poor Richard and Ben Franklin quotes that still ring true today and all of the great illustrations. I had not yet seen this Poor Richard quote, " Who is strong? He that con conquer his bad habits." Indeed! Well worth the reading time, even for adults. The cost of birthing our great country was not small and you can understand more of the cost from this story and the absolute courage of all signers of the Declaration of Independence.

Author-Illustrator Cheryl Harness does a fantastic job with the artwork in this book. Each page is covered with gorgeous, colorful, relevant pictures from top to bottom.Unfortunately, even the wonderful illustrations cannot bring the horribly dry text to life. It reads like a text book or encyclopedia entry. Franklin's life was anything but dull. Yet this story of his life drags and bores readers.I recommend  Benjamin Franklin: A Man of Many Talents  from the Time For Kids Biographies series as a much better written and more interesting alternative to The Remarkable Benjamin Franklin.

I disagree with the reviewer who said this read like a textbook. We are homeschoolers and I tend to avoid textbooks and seek out books that instead can offer my children the information I want them to learn in a fun and engaging way. My children and I read nearly a dozen books about Ben Franklin while doing a unit study on him. We got something out of each of the books but this one offered some of the most detailed stories of Ben. Both my sons, ages 9 and 5, and I all enjoyed this book.