Marie Tharp was always fascinated by the ocean. Taught to think big by her father who was a mapmaker, Marie wanted to do something no one had ever done before: map the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. Throughout history, others had tried and failed to measure the depths of the oceans. Sailors lowered weighted ropes to take measurements. Even today, scientists are trying to measure the depth by using echo sounder machines to track how long it would take a sound wave sent from a ship to the sea floor to come back. But for Marie, it was like piecing together an immense jigsaw puzzle.
Despite past failures and challenges -- sometimes Marie would be turned away from a ship because having a woman on board was "bad luck" -- Marie was determined to succeed. And she did, becoming the first person to chart the ocean floor, helping us better understand the planet we call home.
"Working in a time when women were still unwelcome in her field, Marie Tharp maps the ocean floor and provides convincing evidence for the previously rejected hypothesis of continental drift. Burleigh's choice to write in Tharp's voice makes the determined geologist's story feel immediate, focusing tightly on her map that revealed the spreading Atlantic sea floor....But it's Colón's watercolor-and-pencilillustrations that bring her story alive. Readers see the map-loving child, ships taking the soundings that provided her data, the cartographer with pencil in hand, both graphing and drawing, and, in a wordless double-page spread, the exciting revelation of the rift in the middle of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge." -- Kirkus Reviews
Recommended Age | 5 - 9 |
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Author | Robert Burleigh |
Illustrator | Raul Colon |
ISBN | 1481416006 |
Publication Date | Jan 5, 2016 |
Publisher | Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books |
Language | English |