S is for Smithsonian: America's Museum Alphabet

From A-Z, S is for Smithsonian® explores the amazing objects and memorable displays that are part of this remarkable museum. 

Where can one find the world's largest mounted African elephant? Or the world's largest blue diamond? Why, at the world's largest museum complex and research organization, of course! In S is for Smithsonian® readers can take an armchair tour of the incredible exhibitions and collections found in the Smithsonian Museum. When it opened in 1855, no one could have imagined that the Smithsonian Museum would grow to include 19 museums, nine research centers, or over 130 million objects, artworks, and specimens collected from all over the world. With over 25 million visitors a year, the Smithsonian truly is the world's largest museum!

Roland Smith is the New York Times bestselling author of more than forty books for young people. Among his books are the I, Q series, Peak, Beneath, Above, Zach's Lie, the Cryptid Hunters series, Storm Runners, The Switch, and Elephant Run. Before becoming a full-time writer, he spent more than twenty years working with wildlife all over the world. He was a zookeeper, zoo curator, assistant zoo director, and research biologist. He was instrumental in reintroducing the red wolf back into the wild, and he was a consultant on the Yellowstone National Park gray wolf translocation. Roland and his wife, Marie, split their time between Bentonville, Arkansas, and their small farm near Portland, Oregon.

Author Marie Smith was born and raised in Oregon. She lives on a small farm outside of Portland that she shares with a horse, a goat, two dogs, two cats, and another author, Roland Smith. Together Marie and Roland have written five alphabet books. Besides visiting schools and writing, she spends time traveling across country visiting her four grandsons.

Gijsbert van Frankenhuyzen was born in the Netherlands in 1951. With his seven brothers and sisters, he grew up exploring nature and his sketch pads were filled with observations from those family outings. Always drawing as a young boy, his father encouraged Gijsbert to make art his career. After high school, he attended and graduated from the Royal Academy of Arts in Arnhem, Holland.

Gijsbert, or "Mr. Nick" as many children affectionately call him during his school visits, immigrated to the United States in 1976 and worked as Art Director for the Michigan Natural Resources Magazine for 17 years. In 1995, he illustrated his first children's book, The Legend of Sleeping Bear, finally fullfilling his dream of illustrating children's books.

Residing in Bath, Michigan, Nick and his family share their 40-acre farm with sheep, horses, dogs, cats, turkeys, rabbits, chickens, pigeons and a revolving door of orphaned and injured wild life. The family's nature journals logged 20 years of wild life rehabilitation on the farm and it is through these journals that the popular Hazel Ridge series was created. The farm, the land and the animals make great subjects for the artist to paint.

Mr. Nick travels to schools and conferences to share his passion for drawing--encouraging kids to make their hobby their career.