A rousing biography from Michael J. Rosen and Matt Tavares reveals how Benjamin Franklin’s boyhood shaped his amazingly multifaceted life. Young Benjamin Franklin wants to be a sailor, but his father won’t hear of it. The other trades he tries — candle maker, joiner, boot closer, turner — bore him through and through. Curious and inventive, Ben prefers to read, swim, fly his kite, and fly his kite while swimming. But each time he fails to find a profession, he takes some important bit of knowledge with him. That tendency is exactly what leads him to become the astonishingly versatile genius we remember today. Inspired by The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Michael J. Rosen’s wry tale captures Ben’s spirit in evocative yet playful language, while illustrations by Matt Tavares follow Ben from the workbench to the water in vivid detail. A love story to the value of variety, A Ben of All Trades sheds light on an unconventional path to greatness and humanizes a towering figure in American history.

First published 1963 by William Blackwood & Sons as "Butt and ben."

With a different take on the life of Benedict Arnold, Ben’s Tale reveals an epic story of greed and glory, family and friendship, treason and truthfulness. Told by a history buff who is also a London physician, the drama unfolds as the doctor gets an opportunity to treat—and befriend—the infamous general, and find out for himself whether Arnold’s story is one of slanderous legend or an extraordinary man wrongly accused. The so-called traitor unmasks his tale of woe–of jealous, ambitious founding fathers, doubts about the viability of the new nation and of his relationship with his beautiful wife, Peggy, and her role in facilitating his change of coat.

HEMATITE AND TALES of streets paved with gold drew boatloads of Europeans to the Marquette Iron Range in Michigan's Upper Peninsula in the late 1800s--including my ancestors. the rugged terrain and savage winters of their new home on the "mountain of iron" threatened their survival, yet they had no chance of returning to the Old County--and they knew it. Some left, but the hardy ones stayed, threw up mining camps and drove mineshafts deep into the granite. They raised families--built churches, railroads, and schools--they created a river of iron that cascaded out of the wilderness. Then the Great Depression struck in 1929 and the river of iron dwindled to a trickle. Without means of support the iron miners and their families persevered against a destroyed economy and fierce winters. This is a tale of how my family survived those tough times. It tells of simple things like collecting water, chopping firewood, and slaughtering hogs, but it is also a template for raising and educating a family on challenging terrain in the midst of poverty.