Previous to "Peggy's Puzzles", Volumes One and Two, (BearManor Media, 2023), I authored "Pallenberg Wonder Bears - From the Beginning" (BearManor Media, October 2022); a pictorial history titled, “Images of America CLINTON” (Arcadia Publishing, 2019); five titles for New York City publishers (The John Day Company & Franklin Watts); illustrated two dozen and provided art for the Bronx Zoo; the Humane Society of the United States; Little, Brown & Company; the Journal of Theoretical Biology; the Journal of Algebra; the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics; and World Scientific Publishing. Additionally, I coordinated the 1969 world premiere of "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" for 20th Century Fox; worked as a consultant for the U.S. House of Representatives’ “October Surprise Task Force”, where according to their Deputy Majority Counsel, Michael Zeldin, my work “met and exceeded every expectation”; and organized and hosted the 2015 Edgar Rice Burroughs Bibliophile Convention (aka Dum Dum), which ran for four days in Clinton, Connecticut and was attended by members of the Burroughs’ family and the staff of ERB, Inc, along with authors and illustrators of Burroughs related books and almost 100 bibliophiles, who came from all over North America to celebrate his genius.
An active member of every community in which I've ever lived, I spent eight years as a Clinton, CT Police Commissioner (2005-2013); served on Clinton's Design Review Board (2000-2007); Historic District Commission (2001-2006; 2017- present); and Charter Revision Commission (1997-98 & 2003-04). For Clinton's Department of Parks & Recreation I coached 1st, 2nd & 3rd grade girls softball (2008-2014) and for seven years did the publicity for the Clinton Rotary’s annual Cancer Relief Fund Drive Walk-a-thon. Previously I served on the Board of The Arts Council of Greater New Haven; Planned Parenthood of Greater New Haven; Shoreline Youth Theater; the Madison Arts & Science Council -- and additionally, spent eight years as the program coordinator for the New England Chapter of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers, serving simultaneously on their Board of Directors and three of those years as its Board’s Chairman.
In 2019, my book "Images of America Clinton" won a Literary Award Competition sponsored by the Connecticut Society of Genealogists as Best Research Publication and two years earlier, Marquis Who’s Who presented me with their Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award. Previous honors include the 2001 General Richard G. Stilwell Award, bestowed upon me in Washington D.C. by the Association of Former Intelligence Officers for my work with their New England Chapter; and Duck Island Yacht Club’s 1998 Corinthian Award.
NEWEST WORKS:
"Peggy's Puzzles - Volume Two" (BearManor Media, June 2023)
In 1976, an editor at New York’s Franklin Watts Publishing Company contacted me to say that the United States was going to be “metricized” in 1981. Thus, Watts wanted me to write and illustrate a book that taught the metric system through mathematical games and puzzles. Not knowing anything about the metric system, my Dad, Irving Adler, a well-known author and mathematician, came for a visit and gave me a one day crash course. The book, titled Metric Puzzles, was published in 1977 and was followed, shortly thereafter, by Math Puzzles. Despite excellent reviews and on-going sales, these two, along with my puzzle books published in the early 1960s, were put out-of-print in the mid-1980s. Happily, those earlier puzzle books were republished by BearManor Media as Peggy’s Puzzles – Volume One.
Now, BearManor Media has brought these additional titles back to life as well. Just as with Volume One, all I had to do was change the names of the characters in my puzzles, who were originally named after family, friends and neighbors -- to the names of characters from Old Radio Programs, Movies and TV – or the actors, actresses and animals who portrayed them – and BearManor Media would republish Metric Puzzles and Math Puzzles in one, consolidated volume. So here, hot off the press, is Peggy’s Puzzles – Volume Two. As with Volume One, the illustrations are in black and white - so grab your Crayola ® Colored Pencils for a totally immersive artistic and mathematical experience.
"Fifty-two carefully developed games including mathematical computations, anagrams, and word puzzles teach the metric units for determining area, volume, and temperature. Readers must determine measurements for several children and three hedgehogs who take vitamin C, pick mushrooms, and travel. Peggy Adler's black-and-white pen drawings add to the fun of these
well-conceived exercises which help readers to learn important metric relationships through discovery and analysis." -- Library Journal ("Metric Puzzles")
"Peggy's Puzzles - Volume One" (BearManor Media,March 2023)
In many fields of accomplishment there is one name that stands out above all the rest. In baseball, there’s the home-run king Babe Ruth. In invention, there’s Thomas Edison. In composing military marches it’s John Philip Sousa. And in the invention of puzzles – it’s Sam Loyd. Sam Loyd was born in Philadelphia in 1841. He began his brilliant career at the age of 14 and his puzzles were eventually published in newspapers and magazines all over the United States. After he died in 1911, his son, Sam Loyd, Jr., continued the puzzle columns under his father's name. In 1914, Sam Loyd, Jr. published 5000 of their puzzles under the title, Cyclopedia of Sam Loyd Puzzles.
Peggy’s Puzzle - Volume One is divided into four distinct parts. Part One, is comprised of revised Sam Loyd puzzles that are suitable for children as well as adults and were in my original puzzle book, The Adler Book of Puzzles and Riddles, published in 1962 by New York’s John Day Company. At that time, the New York Times called the book “A great wit-sharpener for the whole family”. And today, it still is just that, for the puzzles and their illustrations remain the same. Only the names of the characters that populate the puzzles have been changed in this edition to reflect my love of Old Time Radio, Movies and TV. Part Two of the book is filled with brand new mathematical games and puzzles, created by me for the 1963 sequel to my 1962 book and Part Three, of Geography Puzzles from my 1979 book of that name. And just as in Part One, the names of the puzzles’ characters have all been changed to reflect my love of Old Time Radio, Movies and TV. Last, but certainly not least, is the book’s Part Four, Games My Father Taught Me, which is comprised of recreational, mathematical games I learned as a child from my late father, renowned prolific author and mathematician, Irving Adler.
The book is lavishly populated with black and white illustrations, to give the puzzle-ist an immersive, art infused experience. So grab a box of Crayola ® Colored Pencils and have some fun, both mathematically and artistically.
Sixty years later, this book is still a great wit-sharpener for the whole family.
AND
"Pallenberg Wonder Bears - From the Beginning" (BearManor Media, October 2022)
Emil Pallenberg (1888-1963) and his companion (and later, wife), Catharina Wouts Suverein (aka Cato), came to the United States through Ellis Island in 1914, with three trained, acrobatic bears to perform in Vaudeville for six months -- and became headliners in Ringling Brothers owned circuses for more than a decade. Emil met Catharina in 1913 while performing with his bears in Holland -- and she ran away with him and his bruins to perform in Russia, leaving behind her innkeeper husband and two year old son.
Pallenberg is considered to have been the greatest bear trainer of his time. In 1908, he became the first person to teach a bear to ride a bicycle. He also taught his bears to roller skate, dance, walk on stilts, play musical instruments and walk the tight rope. The Pallenberg’s bears appeared in major motion pictures -- and one was on Broadway for over a year. Laura was in the 1932 Jerome Kern/Oscar Hammerstein Musical, Music in the Air, while Mischka (aka Carmichael) was featured in a movie with Jack Benny. And when the Pallenbergs and their Wonder Bears weren’t performing, they all lived in the little shoreline town of Clinton, Connecticut.
OTHER WORKS I'VE AUTHORED:
"Images of America CLINTON" (Arcadia)
2019
Geography Puzzles (Franklin Watts)
1979
Math Puzzles (Franklin Watts)
1978
Metric Puzzles (Franklin Watts)
1977
Sets and Numbers for the Very Young as Illustrator (The John Day Company)
1969
The Second Adler Book of Puzzles & Riddles (The John Day Company)
1963
The Adler Book of Puzzles and Riddles: Sam Lloyd up to Date (The John Day Company)
1962
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