Featuring Harold Evans' book

They Made America:

From the Steam Engine to the Search Engine

...and The American Experience television series it inspired

A multimedia and interactive courseware package for multidisciplinary use exploring the central role of innovation in the dramatic growth of the U.S. to superpower status—from the steam engine to the search engine.

America's genius for innovation is revealed on this provocative journey of discovery about men and women whose ideas and energy transformed the societies in which they lived.

» Course Focus

American well-being was built by innovators who had ideas, took risks, were often described as crazy, and gave us cheap electricity, the airplane, the Internet, the iPod, biotech medicines, and so much else.

And it will be sustained in the 21^st century by innovation. But how does innovation happen?

We seek answers by tracing the origins of the critical idea... and the obstacles to its emergence as a practical benefit. For example...

• What was there in the cultural climate that helped or hindered this emergence?

• How did the innovator's character shape the outcome?

• What was the role of money - where did it come from and what did it do? And did the innovations "pay their way?"
» Course Modules

Licensing available for the complete course or individual modules.

I. FUELING AMERICA'S GROWTH
• Conquering the Currents
• Electrifying America

II. PUTTING MONEY TO WORK
• Trading with Strangers
• Banking for the People

III. MERCHANDISING INSPIRATION
• Making Guns and Cars
• Creating Markets for Women
• Exporting Ideas

IV. CONNECTING PEOPLE
• Shrinking the Globe
• Reporting without Deadlines

V. MULTIPLYING BRAINPOWER
• Empowering Business
• Empowering People

VI. DISCOVERING OURSELVES
• Changing Our Lives
• Making Drugs from Genes
» Course Components

1. They Made America by Harold Evans profiles the innovators who shaped the way we live. “History that provokes as well as instructs,” said one review.

2. The American Experience television series inspired by the Evans book edited for educational use and enhanced with web resources.

3. An electronic text of important readings and documents, selected under the direction of Executive Editor Harold Evans and Senior Editors Daniel Kevles and Ruth Schwartz Cowan with the assistance of an advisory committee of prominent scholars. The readings illustrate and amplify the themes of the units.

4. An electronic study guide for both two-year and four-year students.

5. A project website containing interactive exercises and additional materials, including a faculty manual for course instructors.
» Course Development

Making It New is under the direction of Harold Evans, the author of the study of innovators used in the course, and writer/chief commentator for the television series.

Evans, also the author of The American Century, has been a Harkness Fellow at Chicago and Stanford universities, and was president and publisher of the Random House Trade Group from 1990 to 1997.

Serving as Project Director is Dr. George A. Colburn, a pioneer in developing media-based courses for higher education that utilize high-profile television series.

Colburn has produced more than 20 of these national media courses in his career, in addition to his work as a documentary writer and producer.

They Made America:

From the Steam Engine to the Search Engine

» Course Focus

» Course Modules

» Course Components

» Course Development