I didn't have this book when I was a boy -- Essential gear -- The greatest paper airplane in the world -- Seven wonders of the ancient world -- The five knots every boy should know -- Questions about the world: Why is a summer day longer than a winter day? Why is it hotter at the equator? What is a vacuum? What is latitude and longitude? How do you tell the age of a tree? [tree rings] How do we measure the earth's circumference? Why does a day have 24 hours? How far away are the stars? Why is the sky blue? Why can't we see the other side of the moon? What causes tides? How do ships sail against the wind? Where does cork come from? What causes the wind? What is chalk? -- Making a battery -- How to play stickball -- Fossils -- Building a treehouse -- The rules of soccer -- Dinosaurs -- Making a bow and arrow -- Understanding grammar: Nouns, Verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns, conjunctions, articles, prepositions, interjections, sentences, subject and object, nominative and accusative, who and whom, clauses and phrases, tenses -- Table football -- Fishing -- Timers and tripwires -- Baseballs most valuable players -- Famous battles: Thermopylae, Cannae, Caesar's invasions of Britain, Hastings, Crecy, Waterloo, Balaclava, Rorke's Drift, The Somme, Lexington and Concord, The Alamo, Gettysburg --

The rules of Rugby Union and Rugby League

Spies: codes and ciphers

U.S. Naval flag codes

Making crystals

Extraordinary stories: Scott and the Antarctic ; The Wright Brothers ; Touching the Void ; Douglas Bader ; Robert the Bruce

Making a go-cart

Insects and spiders

Juggling

Astronomy

Making a paper hat, boat, and water bomb

Navajo Code Talker's Dictionary

Girls

Marbling paper [marbled paper]

Cloud formations

First aid

The 50 states

Map of the United States

Mountains of the United States

Making cloth fireproof

Building a workbench

Pocket light

Five pen-and-paper games

The golden age of piracy [pirates]

A simple electromagnet

Secret inks

Sampling Shakespeare

Grinding an italic nib

Navigation

The Declaration of Independence

The Moon

Skipping stones

Pinhole projector

Charting the universe

Dog tricks

Wrapping a package in brown paper and string

Star maps: what you see when you look up

Making a periscope

Seven poems every boy should know

Coin tricks

Light

Latin phrases every boy should know

How to play poker

Marbles

A brief history of artillery

The origin of words

The solar system

The Ten Commandments

Common trees

Chess

Hunting and cooking a rabbit

Tanning a skin

Timeline of early American history

Growing sunflowers

Role-playing games

Seven modern wonders of the world

Books every boy should read

Standard and metric measurements

Dangerous Book for Boys badges.