David Macaulay was born in 1946 in Lancashire, England. As a young boy, he loved to make contraptions—such as miniature cable cars and elevators—with string, tape, boxes, and other simple items. At the age of eleven, Macaulay moved with his family to Bloomfield, New Jersey. As he settled into his new surroundings, he began to draw. By the time he finished high school, Macaulay decided to study design and architecture at the Rhode Island School of Design. After college, he experimented with writing and illustrating books, and in 1973 he published his first book, Cathedral. He continued to create books about building—City (about the construction of a Roman city), Pyramid, Castle, Mill, and others. In 1988, The Way Things Work was published. Macaulay revised and updated the award-winning book in 1998, launching The New Way Things Work, from which this selection was chosen.