The Librarian Who Measured the Earth

I love reading children's books to my children and, I have to confess, I enjoy them myself. Oftentimes they explain difficult concepts in an understandable way that more scholarly books just can't. A great read aloud for your 5 - 10 year-old. It is well illustrated and explains how Eratosthenes calculated the circumference of the earth over 2000 years ago. It also takes care of a very persistent myth which is that the people of the ancient times even up through the Middle Ages believed that the earth was flat. That simply is not true and before you know it, this book will lead you into an interesting discussion and further studies with your children when Mrs. Lasky closes with this intriguing thought in the Afterword: "When Columbus finally did set sail west from Spain to the Indies, he should have paid more attention to Eratosthenes' calculations. Instead he looked at maps done by Greek geographers after Eratosthenes. These geographers made some serious mistakes and showed an earth that was not so big around. Columbus thought it would be a quick trip to the Indies. He was wrong. But perhaps if he had believed Eratosthenes' measurements, in which the oceans of the world looked so huge and the distances between land so far, he would have never even tried!"
--Hanno
The Librarian Who Measured the Earth, hardcover, $17.99