EARL'S ELECTRIC HEART

Earl's Electric Heart: Making the First Truly Portable Pacemaker is a narrative nonfiction picture book for ages 6–8 that traces the life of Earl Bakken, inventor of the first battery-powered portable pacemaker. The story opens with young Earl's transformative experience watching Frankenstein in 1931, which ignites a lifelong fascination with electricity and its potential to help people. Through lively, energetic prose peppered with sound words and direct-reader address, the book follows Earl from childhood tinkering through his WWII service, the founding of Medtronic, and finally the pivotal 1957 Halloween blackout that spurred him to build a transistor-based pacemaker in just weeks. The manuscript also honors the many patients whose lives were saved—including Earl himself—and closes by connecting Earl's spark to the Bakken Museum, circling back to the Frankenstein exhibit. Robust back matter includes a pacemaker timeline from ancient Rome to 2023, a diagram of pacemaker function, a note from the Bakken Museum curator, and a thorough source list. Comparable in approach to books like Whoosh! Lonnie Johnson's Super-Soaking Stream of Inventions and The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind (PB edition), it blends engaging biography with STEM concepts and a universal message about perseverance and helping others.