The Heroic Age of American Invention is a science book for children by L. Sprague de Camp, published by Doubleday in 1961. It was reprinted in 1993 by Barnes & Noble under the alternate title The Heroes of American Invention. The book has been translated in Portuguese.
Summary By "heroic age" the author means the era of American history in which individual initiative and enterprise constituted the primary thread in technical innovation, roughly from the early 19th century until mass production and corporate enterprise outpaced that of the individual around the time of World War I. The story of innovation is told through the biographies and inventions of thirty-two key inventors of the United States' Industrial Revolution, whom de Camp feels were pivotal in converting the country from an agrarian nation to an industrial one. Some of the inventors spotlighted include Robert L. Stevens, George Westinghouse, Joseph Henry, Samuel Morse, Samuel Colt, Hiram Stevens Maxim, Hudson Maxim, Cyrus McCormick, John Ericsson, William Kelly, Ottmar Mergenthaler, Christopher Latham Sholes, Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, Elihu Thomson, Nikola Tesla, George Baldwin Selden, Samuel Pierpoint Langley, Wilbur Wright, Orville Wright, Reginald Aubrey Fessenden, Lee de Forest, and Edwin Howard Armstrong.
Contents I. Invention Comes to America II. The Heroic Age Begins III. The Stevenses and Railroading IV. Henry, Morse, and the Telegraph V. Colt and Other Gunmakers VI. McCormick and Farm Machinery VII. Ericsson and the Modern Warship VIII. Kelly and Steel Refining IX. Mergenthaler, Sholes, and Writing Machines X. Bell and the Telephone XI. Edison and the Electric Light XII. Thomson and Alternating-Current Power XIII. Selden and the Automobile XIV. Langley, The Wrights, and Flying XV. Fessenden, De Forest, and Radio XVI. The End of the Heroic Age Notes Bibliography Index
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