The Twenty-One Balloons facts for kids
First edition
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| Author | William Pène du Bois |
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| Illustrator | William Pène du Bois |
| Cover artist | William Pène du Bois |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Children's novel |
| Publisher | The Viking Press |
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Publication date
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1947 |
| Media type | Print (hardcover and paperback) |
| Pages | 181 |
| ISBN | 0-14-032097-0 |
| OCLC | 17885994 |
The Twenty-One Balloons is a fun adventure novel written by William Pène du Bois. It was published in 1947 by the Viking Press. The book won a special award called the Newbery Medal in 1948. This award is given to the best American children's book.
The story is about a retired schoolteacher named Professor William Waterman Sherman. He goes on an amazing balloon trip that doesn't go as planned. This leads him to discover Krakatoa, a secret island. The island is full of great wealth and fantastic inventions! The events and ideas in the book mix real scientific facts with lots of imagination. William Pène du Bois also drew all the pictures in the book. The story also describes the famous 1883 eruption of Krakatoa.
Contents
Professor Sherman's Amazing Adventure
The book begins by comparing two types of journeys. One type is about getting to a place as fast as possible. The other type is about traveling slowly, without a set destination. The story says that balloon travel is perfect for the second kind of journey.
The Rescue and the Story Begins
The main story starts with the rescue of Professor William Waterman Sherman. A steamship finds him floating in the North Atlantic Ocean. He is surrounded by the strange wreck of twenty deflated gas balloons. Just three weeks earlier, Sherman, a recently retired schoolteacher, had left San Francisco. He was in a giant balloon, planning to spend a year relaxing alone.
The world is very curious to know how Sherman traveled around the globe so quickly. They also wonder how he ended up in the ocean with twenty balloons, not just the one he started with. After a few days of rest and a hero's welcome, the professor tells his story. He shares his incredible journey with a very interested audience.
Landing on Krakatoa
Professor Sherman's flight over the Pacific Ocean was calm at first. But then, a seagull accidentally punctured his balloon! This forced him to crash-land on a small volcanic island. There, he meets a friendly man named Mr. F.
Mr. F tells him that he has landed on the island of Krakatoa. This island is home to twenty families. They share the wealth from a secret diamond mine. It is the richest diamond mine in the whole world! The families work together to control the diamonds. They are like a "cartel," meaning they work together to keep the diamonds valuable.
Each year, the families sail to the outside world. They sell a small amount of diamonds to buy supplies for their hidden, advanced civilization. They explain that selling too many diamonds at once would make them worthless. They say it would be like "a shipload of broken glass."
Life on Krakatoa Island
Each family on Krakatoa has been given one of the first twenty letters of the alphabet. They live in their own unique and amazing houses. Each house also serves as a restaurant! The Krakatoa society uses a special calendar with twenty-day months.
On "A" Day of each month, everyone eats at Mr. and Mrs. A's American restaurant. On "B" Day, they eat at Mr. and Mrs. B's British chop house. On "C" Day, they go to Mr. and Mrs. C's Chinese restaurant, and so on.
Professor Sherman's first friend on the island, Mr. F, runs a French restaurant. It even has a copy of the famous Hall of Mirrors inside! The houses on the island are full of incredible things. For example, Mr. M's Moroccan house has a living room with furniture that moves around like bumper cars! The children on the island even invented their own fun game. It combines ideas from merry-go-rounds and balloon travel.
Escaping the Volcano
One day, the volcano on Krakatoa erupts! The families and Professor Sherman must escape. They build a large platform held up by twenty balloons. As the platform floats westward around the world, the families parachute off. They land in places like India and Belgium to start new lives.
Professor Sherman stays on the platform. Finally, he descends onto the waters of the Atlantic Ocean. That is where he is rescued. The professor finishes his speech by telling the audience his next plan. He wants to build an even better balloon for a year of living in the air. He plans to pay for it with the diamond cufflinks he got in Krakatoa!
A Note from the Author
Before the book was published, the author, William Pène du Bois, found out something interesting. His publisher noticed that The Twenty-One Balloons was very similar to another story. This story was called The Diamond as Big as the Ritz by F. Scott Fitzgerald, written in 1922.
Du Bois said he had never heard of Fitzgerald's story before. He found it very strange that they both had such similar ideas. Both stories involve a giant diamond mine and the need to keep its existence a secret. However, The Twenty-One Balloons is a children's story with a fun, playful tone. Fitzgerald's story, on the other hand, was written for adults and had a much darker tone.
