In this colorful and intimate narrative, Isaacson provides the full sweep of Franklin's amazing life, showing how he helped to forge the American national identity and why he has a particular resonance in the twenty-first century. --

Mattie Knight loved to make things ranging from a foot warmer for her mother or toys for her older brothers. Or, when she was 12, a metal guard to prevent shuttles from shooting off looms and hurting workers. Later, Mattie invented a machine that could cut and glue the square-bottomed paper bags we still use today. Meet the woman known as "the Lady Edison."

An introduction to the life of young Benjamin Franklin describes how, as a rebellious teen in 1732, he ran away from his family and a Boston apprenticeship to Philadelphia, and how throughout subsequent decades he rose to become a distinguished statesman, renowned author and world-famous scientist.

Details the life and work of Thomas Edison, who developed such inventions as the stock ticker, the lightbulb, and the phonograph.

Describes how Mattie Knight developed her first invention, a stop-motion device to make looms safer for workers.