While no attempt is made to present a continuous history of our country, these biographies show its development from the time of discovery and exploration through the days of colonization and settlement to the present period of invention and industrial supremacy.
CONTENTS
| PAGE | |
| Adams, Samuel | [ 149] |
| Bacon, Nathaniel | [ 122] |
| Baltimore, Cecil Calvert, Lord | [ 105] |
| Barton, Clara | [ 290] |
| Bell, Alexander Graham | [ 236] |
| Boone, Daniel | [ 200] |
| Cabot, John | [ 37] |
| Carnegie, Andrew | [ 297] |
| Champlain, Samuel de | [ 94] |
| Clay, Henry | [ 247] |
| Clinton, DeWitt | [ 218] |
| Columbus, Christopher | [ 20] |
| De Soto, Ferdinand | [ 31] |
| Dewey, George B. | [ 292] |
| Drake, Sir Francis | [ 41] |
| Edison, Thomas A. | [ 238] |
| Farragut, David G. | [ 282] |
| Field, Cyrus W. | [ 236] |
| Franklin, Benjamin | [ 126] |
| Fulton, Robert | [ 223] |
| Grant, Ulysses S. | [ 267] |
| Greene, Nathanael | [ 176] |
| Hamilton, Alexander | [ 193] |
| Henry, Patrick | [ 142] |
| Hudson, Henry | [ 80] |
| Jackson, Andrew | [ 240] |
| Jefferson, Thomas | [ 186] |
| Jones, John Paul | [ 181] |
| Lafayette, Marie Jean, Marquis de | [ 212] |
| La Salle, Robert de | [ 100] |
| Lee, Robert E. | [ 277] |
| Leif the Lucky | [ 7] |
| Lincoln, Abraham | [ 257] |
| McCormick, Cyrus | [ 230] |
| Macdonough, Thomas | [ 204] |
| Minuit, Peter | [ 84] |
| Montcalm, Louis, Marquis de | [ 136] |
| Morse, Samuel F. B. | [ 233] |
| Oglethorpe, James Edward | [ 114] |
| Penn, William | [ 109] |
| Perry, Oliver Hazard | [ 204] |
| Philip, King of Wampanoags | [ 118] |
| Pocahontas | [ 58] |
| Polo, Marco | [ 13] |
| Raleigh, Sir Walter | [ 46] |
| Schuyler, Philip | [ 169] |
| Smith, Captain John | [ 51] |
| Standish, Miles | [ 62] |
| Stephenson, George | [ 220] |
| Stuyvesant, Peter | [ 89] |
| Washington, George | [ 156] |
| Webster, Daniel | [ 253] |
| Whitney, Eli | [ 226] |
| Williams, Roger | [ 76] |
| Winthrop, John, Governor | [ 70] |
| Wolfe, James | [ 136] |
BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES FROM
AMERICAN HISTORY
FOR THE FIFTH AND SIXTH GRADES
Leif the Lucky
From the northwestern coast of Europe projects the rock-ribbed Scandinavian peninsula. The scenery is grand and picturesque, but the soil is sterile and the climate severe. In this bleak, beautiful country and on the adjacent islands of the Baltic Sea, there lived, a thousand years ago, the people called the Norsemen or Northmen.
Their houses were usually long wooden structures a hundred or two hundred feet in length. Sometimes these houses were divided into several rooms, but often the dwelling consisted of only one large hall or living-room. On the floor of stone or hard-trampled earth, was kindled a fire, the smoke from which found its way upward and out through the crevices of the high-pitched roof. On three sides of the room were built beds,—shelf-like structures of boards, with skins for bedding and blankets.
The Norsemen did not even attempt to wrest a living from the reluctant soil. At home their days were given to hunting and fishing, their evenings to feasting in the hall. While they sat at table, the scalds, as their poets were called, sang or recited tales of battles, conquests, voyages,—the daring deeds of the vikings or sea-robbers and the sea-kings of their race. Thus in hunting, fishing, and feasting passed the winter.
When summer unlocked the storm- and ice-bound harbors, the Norsemen put forth in their ships. Their long-ships, or ships of war, were long, narrow vessels; on each side were benches for rowers and over the sides hung the shining shields of the Norsemen. Hundreds of these little vessels pushed off boldly from the shores of Scandinavia every summer. The Norsemen knew nothing of the mariner’s compass, and they directed their course on the pathless seas by means of the stars. This was a dangerous undertaking, and in stormy, foggy weather, many a boat lost its bearings and went down with all on board.