George Washington Carver devoted his life to research projects connected primarily with southern agriculture. The products he derived from the peanut and the soybean revolutionized the economy of the South by liberating it from an excessive dependence on cotton.

George Washington Carver was an agricultural chemist and botanist whose colorful life story and eccentric personality transformed him into a popular American folk hero to people of all races. Born into slavery, he spent his first 30 years wandering through three states and working at odd jobs to obtain a basic education. His lifelong effort thereafter to better the lives of poor Southern black farmers by finding commercial uses for the region's agricultural products and natural resources--in particular the peanut, sweet potato, cowpea, soybean, and native clays from the soil--brought him international recognition as a humanitarian and chemical wizard. An accomplished artist and pianist as well, Carver was among the...