2008

Peter Sis.  The Wall:  Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain

In his most personal work to date, award-winning author Peter Ss offers a brilliant graphic memoir, taking readers on an extraordinary journey as he recalls his youth growing up in Czechoslovakia in the 1960s, when his country was on the Communist side of the Iron Curtain.

2007

Catherine Thimmesh.  Team Moon:  How 400,000 People Landed

Apollo 11 on the Moon  Culled from direct quotes from the people behind the scenes, NASA transcripts, national archives and NASA photos, the whole story of Apollo 11 and the first moon landing emerges.

2006

Sally M. Walker.  Secrets of a Civil War Submarine:  Solving the

Mysteries of the H. L. Hunley  

2005

Russell Freedman.  The Voice That Challenged a Nation:  Marian

Anderson and the Struggle for Equal Rights   In the mid-1930s, Marian Anderson was a famed vocalist who had been applauded by European royalty and welcomed at the White House. But, because of her race, she was denied the right to sing at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C. This is the story of her resulting involvement in the civil rights movement of the time.

2004

Jim Murphy.  An American Plague

It's 1793, and there's an invisible killer roaming the streets of Philadelphia. The city's residents are fleeing in fear. This killer has a name -- yellow fever -- but everything else about it is a mystery. Its cause is unknown, and there is no cure. This powerful, dramatic account by award-winning author Jim Murphy traces the devastating course of the epidemic. The medical beliefs and practices of the time and the conditions that helped the disease to spread through the city that was then the nation's capital are vividly detailed. So, too, is the heroic role that free black Philadelphians played in saving their city.

2003

James Cross Giblin. Life and Death of Adolf Hitler

In a straightforward and nonsensational manner, James Cross Giblin explores the forces that shaped the man as well as the social conditions that furthered his rapid rise to power. He traces the arc of Hitler's life from his childhood in Austria and his youthful ambition to be an artist to his final days in an embattled bunker under Berlin. What emerges is a portrait of a charismatic leader as well as a deeply disturbed man.

2002

Susan Campbell Bartoletti. Black Potatoes: The Story of the Great

Irish Famine, 1845-1850   This account of the potato blight that struck in Ireland tells the story of the men, women, and children who made every attempt to survive and hang on to hope.

2001

Marc Aronson. Sir Walter Ralegh and the Quest for El Dorado

Recounts the adventurous life of the English explorer and courtier who spelled his name " Ralegh " and led many expeditions to the New World.