Books with author Susan Sales Harkins and William H. Harkins

The English colony of Georgia was the product of specific goals. First, England hoped to provide its most impoverished citizens opportunities for land and a new life. Second, the frontier needed a military buffer between Charles Town, the southernmost settlement, and the Spanish in Florida. Third, it certainly wouldn t hurt if the Georgia settlers produced raw materials and goods to export to England. It was one of the most auspicious and ambitious colonial plans. Unfortunately, the well-meaning and charitable Trustees didn t really know what they were doing. They chose crops that wouldn t grow in the Georgia climate and soil. They prohibited slaves, and while that decision was progressive for those times, it put the settlers at an economic disadvantage. They simply couldn t compete with the other colonies for new settlers and continued financing. Georgia wasn t a failure, but its settlers worked harder than any others to survive.

At age nine, Tutankhamen became pharaoh, ruler of Egypt. His most important act was to reestablish his people s religion of multiple gods. Before age twenty, he was dead. For over three thousand years, Egypt s desert sand hid the tomb of Tutankhamen, and Egyptians forgot about the ancient king. Then, in 1922, archaeologist Howard Carter found a door buried in the sand. It led to the greatest ancient Egyptian treasure ever found. Tutankhamen didn t have time to become a great pharaoh, but his tomb is a modern treasure, but not just for its gold and jewels, but for the stories it holds about ancient Egypt.

William, the son of a duke and a peasant, spent his childhood in hiding, raised among the Norman peasantry. Lords owing fealty to him would have murdered him if they had found him. He spent his early adult years fighting rebel lords for his birthright. As Duke of Normandy, he claimed the throne of England after the death of Edward the Confessor, King of England, who William said had promised to name him heir. When England refused him, he built a huge fleet, sailed across the channel, and killed Harold, the newly crowned English king, at the Battle of Hastings. One by one, English towns fell to William and his Norman army as they marched toward London. Cowering in fear, Londoners had no choice they opened the gates and made William the Conqueror their first Norman king.

Richard I, king of England from 1189 to 1199, was a brilliant soldier and military strategist. His fierceness in battle during the Third Crusade won him the title of Coeur de Lion, or Lionheart. Even his most formidable enemy, Saladin, respected Richard and feared his army. Saladin s own emirs were terrified of the warrior they called Malek Rik. For decades following Richard s crusade, Muslim mothers called upon his name to frighten their children into behaving. Despite his legendary heart of a lion in battle, he was honorable and generous as a king at least for a king of his time. Richard the Lionheart was a king, a warrior, a hero, and a legend in his own time.

Sam Houston did it all! He lived with the Cherokee Indians as a teenager. Then, he joined the Army and helped defeat the British in the War of 1812. Later, he served the Republic of Texas as its first President. Through it all, Houston was a man of honor. When the United States government failed to keep their treaty with the Cherokee Indians, it was Sam Houston who marched into Washington D.C., dressed in his Indian headdress. Sam Houston took the problem all the way to the President of the United States Andrew Jackson. As a man of honor, Sam Houston demanded the United States honor their promises. The only thing that rivaled his sense of honor was his love of Texas. Even his dying words were of Texas... Texas. Texas... he mumbled just before he died. An honorable man, an honorable life, and Texas is his legacy.

Pythagoras was a man of his times and for all times. So important to mankind was his birth that the gods sent his birth announcement via the Pythian oracle. Tradition holds that he studied with the greatest minds the ancients had to offer. Pherecydes taught him that the soul is immortal. Thales and Anaximander taught him to trust only what he experienced. He studied with the first recorded scientist. Egyptian priests taught him radical ideas about the human soul. From the Babylonians magi, he learned higher mathematics and about the cosmos. He probably had the most well rounded higher education of any other living person of his time, but when most men were done with life, Pythagoras was just making his mark. Around the age of fifty, he founded a school of higher mathematics, philosophy, music, and religion. His lessons still impact our scientific and moral communities today.

European explorers searched in vain for a northwest waterway through the North American continent. French traders living in the northeast heard of a great river that the natives called Messi-Sipi to the west. Was this river the Northwest Passage? Or was the Messi-Sipi really the Rio Grande, the river that Hernando de Soto had discovered a century earlier? That s what Father Jacques Marquette and his companion explorer Louis Jolliet hoped to discover in 1673. It s hard to imagine a more unlikely explorer and hero than Father Jacques Marquette, yet his gentle and compassionate nature made him the perfect ambassador to the friendly native peoples they met along the banks of the great Mississippi River.

Betsy Ross is one of America s most endearing and beloved characters. Widowed and alone, early in the Revolutionary War, Betsy was approached by three great men. They knew she was a Patriot and a good seamstress. Would she sew America s first flag for them? Fighting heartbreak, loneliness, and poverty, she accepted the challenge willingly. She couldn t fight for independence, but she could certainly sew for it! Tradition tells us that Betsy agreed to make the flag. First she pieced together the red and white stripes. Then she appliquéd thirteen five-point stars one for each colony onto a field of dark blue. But did Betsy Ross really sew America s first Stars and Stripes flag? It wasn t until 1870 that her grandson William Canby told Betsy s story to the Historical Society of Pennsylvania and the rest is history, so to speak. Americans don t seem to mind that the story can t be proven. They love Betsy Ross and they love her flag whether she really sewed it or not!

What would you do to survive? Most modern Americans never have to answer that question. In 1846, the members of the Donner Party answered it. For months, they walked across the Great Plains. They spent the hottest months of the year using chains and ropes to pull their wagons over mountains. In a hurry to get to California and following bad advice, they forged into unknown territory, hoping to find a quicker route than others had taken. When the winter snows came early to the Sierra Nevada, they were trapped. They were exhausted, with no food and no shelter. One by one, they began to die of starvation and disease. With no rescue in sight, all but one family did the unthinkable they ate the flesh of their dead companions in order to survive. Read the harrowing tale of the early pioneers survival and persistence.

People all around the world enjoy the hobby of gardening. They love planting tiny seeds in the soil and watching them sprout into mature plants. Gardening isn t just for adults, however. Kids can plan, create, and maintain their own gardens, too. Gardening for Kids is rich with ideas and instructions for making water gardens, flower gardens, vegetable gardens, perennial gardens, butterfly gardens, and landscape designs. Color adds an irresistible dimension to any yard. Put a pair of wings on that color and suddenly your yard is alive with life! Butterflies live all over the country, so you re likely to see them no matter where you live. To attract butterflies to your backyard, you need to provide the things they like: nectar, water, sun, and shelter. For most of us, this is as easy as planting some wildflower seeds in a sunny spot. In just a few months, the tiny seeds have grown into huge, beautiful flowers that butterflies just can t resist. A butterfly log house for shelter is also easy to build. Everyone wins you enjoy the butterflies, and the butterflies get a satisfying home.

Pocahontas was just a child when her world changed forever. White men from across the ocean built a fort near her village. Most likely, Pocahontas had never seen a white man before. Some of her people feared the settlers, but Pocahontas wanted to know more about them. She took the settlers food and taught Captain John Smith her language. Find out how this bright, brave young girl became an ambassador for her people, helping to keep the peace between her people and the settlers at least for a while. Discover how she charmed all of England, and why she still captures the hearts of Americans.

The ancient Greeks worshiped a complex group of deities, weaving their characters into timeless tales of love, heroism, and intrigue. Plays, poems, paintings, and sculptures commemorating these tales have survived for centuries. Even as world religions and scientific knowledge have evolved, bringing with them new beliefs and understanding of the world, the ancient Greek tales continue to provide a basic foundation for Western thought and sharp insight to the human psyche. In the story of Perseus, the hero, rejected and feared by his grandfather, is cast into the sea with his mother to die. Fortunately for Perseus, fate has other plans for them. Perseus kills a gorgon, a giant, and an angry sea monster; marries a beautiful princess; turns a crowd to stone; and saves his mother from a vengeful king. His destiny takes him back to his birthplace in search of his grandfather. Only then does he finally fulfill his fate and live happily ever after.