Annal:2001 Sibert Medal

Sir Walter Ralegh and the Quest for El Dorado

Marc Aronson

• 2001 Sibert winner
• 2000 Horn Book-nonfiction winner
• Score: 20.51

Sir Walter Ralegh played the starring role in a life that was a series of romantic, almost-too-spectacular-to-be-true adventures. From the dazzling court of Queen Elizabeth to the dense jungles of South America, from daring sea raids to the epic struggle against the Spanish Armada, from his luminous historical writings to his intimate poetry, Ralegh left his mark on the age. His life was as dramatic and complex as a Shakespearean play.

Ralegh was a man of great contradictions: He participated in the massacre of Catholics in Ireland, yet later supported…

The Longitude Prize

Joan Dash, Dusan Petricic

• 2001 Horn Book-nonfiction winner
• 2001 Sibert honor
• Score: 16.51

By the start of the eighteenth century, many thousands of sailors had perished at sea because their captains had no way of knowing longitude, their east-west location. Latitude, the north-south position, was easy enough, but once out of sight of land not even the most experienced navigator had a sure method of fixing longitude. So the British Parliament offered a substantial monetary prize to whoever could invent a device to determine exact longitude at sea.

Blizzard!: The Storm That Changed America

Jim Murphy

• 2001 Sibert honor
• Score: 6.51

Snow began falling over New York City on March 12, 1888. All around town, people struggled along slippery streets and sidewalks — some seeking the warmth of their homes, some to get to work or to care for the less fortunate, and some to experience what they assumed would be the last little snowfall of one of the warmest winters on record. What no one realized was that in a very few hours, the wind and snow would bury the city in nearly 21 inches of snow and bring it to a ferocious standstill.

My Season with Penguins: An Antarctic Journal

Sophie Webb

• 2001 Sibert honor
• Score: 6.51

What is it like to live in a tiny polar haven for two months? To paint penguins outdoors in freezing weather? To be flipper-slapped by a bird whose wings are powerful enough to propel it swiftly through frigid waters? To look into the oddly expressive eyes of a penguin chick?

Pedro and Me: Friendship, Loss, and What I Learned

Judd Winick

• 2001 Sibert honor
• Score: 6.51

Pedro taught a generation that AIDS was not a punishment for moral defects or a mere killer that reduced humans to wraiths. Rather, he showed how those afflicted with the disease could live and love nobly with intelligence, humor and great humanity.