They All Laughed, by Ira Flatow

Retrieved from: my library
006016445x, 1992
Suggested by: that long list, etc. etc.
My Ratings: 9 Merit, 8 Interest, 6 Fun

New winner!!! Longest subtitle:

From Light Bulbs to Lasers: The Fascinating Stories Behind Great Inventions That Have Changed Our Lives

Fun. Oldish. But if you listen to Ira Flatow on NPR, it’s kind of fun to ‘listen’ to this book in your head as you read. He covers the Big Obvious Inventors--Franklin, Bell, Edison--right away, but then moves on to lesser-knowns like John Logie Baird (who may, or may not, have invented television), René-Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur (who noticed that wasps make paper out of vegetable fibers) and Willy Higinbotham (builder of the first video game, in 1958), among others.

Pretty amazing stuff in here, and it’s all presented in a readable format for people like me who don’t know (or care) the difference between an anion and an onion. Flatow also, in the epilogue, mildly castigates American corporations today whose interest is solely in the bottom line, relegating creativity and invention to 9th-class status, almost to the point of penalizing people who come up with new ideas.

Oh, well. Great book for reports, too. I'll have to remember it.