"Each day in living is an adventure in learning." This lifelong philosophy led Benjamin Banneker to become a brilliant astronomer, mathematician, biologist, surveyor, author, and musician.

Taught to read by his beloved grandmother—an Englishwoman who had come to the colonies as an indentured servant—Banneker became the first man to publish a popular almanac using original astronomical and tide tables.  He was one of those instrumental in saving the original surveyor's design of Washington, D.C., and the first person to construct a clock of entirely American-made parts (he made the parts of wood, following the design of a pocket watch).  He also became one of the first blacks to publicly denounce slavery.

Benjamin Banneker corresponded with Thomas Jefferson and had contact with George Washington.  He numbered among his friends and business associates Benjamin Rush, the most influential doctor in America during that time; the Reverend Richard Allen, founder of the African Methodist episcopal Church; William Goddard, publisher of the Maryland Journal and founder of the U.S. Postal Service; Dr. James McHenry, famed Maryland senator; and the Reverend Absalom Jones.

Benjamin Banneker was truly an intellectual leader of early America.

From the dust jacket