Correction Appended: Feb. 22, 2012
Your new book,
What Color Is My World?
, is about inventors. Why inventors?
I wanted to pick a subject that would really surprise people. Most people in the world, including black Americans, don't think of black Americans as inventors of anything.
Was there a particular inventor you found really interesting?
Lewis Latimer. He did Alexander Graham Bell's patent-application drawings, and then he went on to invent the filament for the lightbulb.
... I was hoping you'd go with Lonnie Johnson, the inventor of the Super Soaker.
I've never had the opportunity...