Book Notes: Biography of Clarence Birdseye

The first thing I see when I open Mark Kurlansky’s entertaining new biography, “Birdseye: The Adventures of a Curious Man,” is a portrait of Clarence Frank Birdseye II sitting at his desk in September 1943. By the end of the book you have to wonder when he ever sat down. The small, wiry genius didn’t stop till his heart gave out.

North Shore Book Notes: Life of Gloucester's Clarence Birdseye

The first thing I see when I open Mark Kurlansky’s entertaining new biography, “Birdseye: The Adventures of a Curious Man,” is a portrait of Clarence Frank Birdseye II sitting at his desk in September 1943. By the end of the book you have to wonder when he ever sat down. The small, wiry genius didn’t stop till his heart gave out.

Baraga’s Mattson saved Howe’s career

ESCANABA - Gordie Howe's illustrious professional hockey career spanned five decades, but if it wasn't for Baraga native Carl Mattson, Howe's career may have lasted just five years.

The blonde pimpernel

We seek him here, we seek him there, Those Frenchies seek him everywhere. Is he in heaven? - Is he in hell? That demmed, elusive Pimpernel. - Baroness Orczy's The Scarlet Pimpernel

What Are Science's Ugliest Experiments?

When I teach history of science at Stevens Institute of Technology, I devote plenty of time to science’s glories, the kinds of achievements that my buddy George Johnson wrote about in The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments (Alfred A. Knopf, 2008). George helps us appreciate what Galileo did with inclined planes, Newton with prisms, Pavlov with dogs, Galvani with frogs, Millikan with oil drops ...