Yvonne Clark and Her Engineering Spark

by Allen R. Wells, DeAndra Hodge (Illustrator)

Overview

Based on a true story, this inspiring picture book is about a curious, tinkering girl who grew up to become one of the first Black female engineers for NASA – for fans of Ada Twist, Scientist and Counting on Katherine.

Yvonne Clark had an engineering spark—an instinct for figuring out how things worked.

Broken lamp? She screwed, rewired, and wrenched until…light!
Wrecked radio? She twisted, snipped, and hammered until…music!
Clogged furnace? She picked, plucked, and cleared until…heat!

When she grew up, Yvonne’s problem-solving power took her to NASA, where fellow engineers had a serious problem with the Saturn V rocket’s F-1 engine: It had hot spots—high temperatures in the engine.

Can Yvonne Clark and her engineering spark solve the problem?

In an electric tribute, Allen R. Wells artfully tells the life story of his favorite engineering professor who also happened to be one of our nation’s most influential African American engineers. DeAndra Hodge’s bright illustrations explode with energy, matching the vibrance of Yvonne as a creative child and following her rise to NASA and beyond.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780374394776
Publisher:	Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publication date:	01/07/2025
Sold by:	Macmillan
Format:	eBook
Pages:	40
Age Range:	4 - 7 Years

About the Author

Allen R. Wells is an author and engineer. He was born in Jackson, Mississippi. He studied Architectural Engineering at Tennessee State University in Nashville. He is the author of It's Pride, Baby! and Yvonne Clark and Her Engineering Spark. He currently lives in Virginia.

DeAndra Hodge is an illustrator and character designer based in Washington D.C. She graduated with a Bachelors in Fine Art from the University of Montevallo. She is the illustrator of Yvonne Clark and Her Engineering Spark by Allen R. Wells. DeAndra grew up in Huntsville, Alabama, a.k.a “Rocket City” where Yvonne Clark spent a summer working on the Saturn V booster engine.

DeAndra Hodge is an illustrator and character designer based in Washington D.C. She graduated with a Bachelors in Fine Art from the University of Montevallo. She is the illustrator of Yvonne Clark and Her Engineering Spark by Allen R. Wells. DeAndra grew up in Huntsville, Alabama, a.k.a “Rocket City” where Yvonne Clark spent a summer working on the Saturn V booster engine.

Editorial Reviews

"A buoyant profile of Yvonne Clark (1929-2019), a lifelong tinkerer with a knack for making everything work better, from the family toaster to giant rockets... Inspirational fare for aspiring engineers and scientists." —Kirkus

From the Publisher

2024-09-28
A buoyant profile of Yvonne Clark (1929-2019), a lifelong tinkerer with a knack for making everything work better, from the family toaster to giant rockets.

Dubbing his former college teacher’s “remarkable spark for building and fixing things” a “superpower,” Wells takes her through a series of hands-on projects—beginning with malfunctioning household appliances that she methodically disassembled and studied as a child to later work solving pesky design problems in both a new type of rifle and in NASA’s humongous Saturn V rocket. The author also celebrates the stubborn determination that won Clark a post–World War II career in mechanical engineering and a university position despite the discrimination she encountered as a Black woman in a field dominated by white men. From overall-clad child to brisk, sensibly attired adult, her confidence and strength of character shine in Hodge’s illustrations as she wields hand tools, pores over blueprints, marches into groups of stymied-looking male colleagues to explain her solutions, and climactically stands in quiet triumph with a racially diverse group of children to watch the successful 1967 test launch of the first unmanned Saturn V rocket. That same confidence radiates from the appended photos, which take her from teenager to octogenarian.

Inspirational fare for aspiring engineers and scientists. (author’s note, selected bibliography)(Picture-book biography. 7-9)

Kirkus Reviews