Review by Booklist Review
Kicked off by a doubly punny title, this cheery historical episode pays tribute to a Surinamese American tinkerer who revolutionized the shoe-manufacturing industry. Keller retraces Jan Matzeliger's progress from his early years in Surinam to Lynn, Massachusetts, the "Shoe Capital of the World," where, overcoming the multiple obstacles of being a Black immigrant who spoke only Dutch, he found work in a factory where a skilled "laster" could turn out 20 to 30 pairs of shoes a week. Seeing room for improvement, he experimented for three years before cobbling together a device from scrap metal and cigar boxes that sped the process up to 700 pairs a day. Along with airy glimpses of nineteenth-century docks, workplaces, and antique gadgets, Costanza portrays the dapper inventor puzzling over his project, demonstrating it to a skeptical patent inspector, and posing proudly at the end, surrounded by a glowing cloud of colorful period footwear. A closing note ties the tale up neatly, filling in context and detail to underscore the scope of Matzeliger's achievement.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Jan Matzeliger's name might not be on everyone's lips, but it should be on everyone's feet. The son of a mechanic-shop owner, Jan was raised in Dutch-speaking Suriname. At 19, he began working on a merchant ship, sailing around the world until he landed in Philadelphia. (The year is unspecified, but readers are told that "the Civil War had ended nearly a decade earlier.") As "a Black immigrant who couldn't speak English," Jan struggled but found work in a shoe factory. Seeing the labor-intensive hand process used to sew a shoe's upper piece to its sole, he proposed mechanizing the task. The other workers scoffed. Even after moving to a shoe-manufacturing center in Lynn, Massachusetts, Jan still met with skepticism, but he persisted, arduously building his machine (which dramatically increased productivity) and receiving a patent. Keller details Jan's painstaking process, reinforcing the message of perseverance. Costanza's flat, clear illustrations, in muted sepia and blue, abound in period details. They are slightly stylized and somewhat fanciful but reflect photographic evidence of Matzeliger's appearance and provide touches of humor. Playful use of typography and depictions of the machine parts Jan designed add appeal. Only the final pages of the backmatter reveal that Matzeliger died of tuberculosis at 37, just six years after his patent was approved. Skill and persistence lead to STEM success against historical odds in this brief and attractive biography.(Picture-book biography. 6-9) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
