Story of mankind: illustrated, the

Hendrik Willem van Loon was a Dutch-American historian, journalist, and award-winning author. He was born in Rotterdam, Netherlands, went to the United States in 1902 to study at Cornell University, receiving his degree in 1905. Van Loon received his Ph.D. from the University of Munich in 1911 with a dissertation that became his first book, The Fall of the Dutch Republic (1913). He was a correspondent for the Associated Press during the Russian Revolution of 1905 and again in Belgium in 1914 at the start of World War I, lectured at Cornell University from 1915 to 1917; in 1919 he became an American citizen. From the 1910s until his death, Van Loon wrote many books, illustrating them himself. Most widely known among these is The Story of Mankind, a history of the world, which won the first Newbery Medal in 1922. As a writer he was known for emphasizing crucial historical events and giving a complete picture of individual characters, as well as the role of the arts in history. He also had an informal and thought-provoking style which, particularly in The Story of Mankind, included special emphasis on the people and events that changed the course of history. His book The Story of Mankind nowadays is in the public domain, but a great work has been done by Publisher to this version to make an electronic book that contrasts favourably to the original version. A lot of errors that exist in the free versions have been corrected; proper navigation is available or shortly, the ASCII text has been converted into a proper e-book. And the most important, in addition to 118 original author's illustrations and maps were added many new illustrations that help us to see how the History comes to Life.