When you eat foods that are wrapped in cellophane, when you ride in a car equipped with safety glass and powered by gasoline, when you wear a shirt made of nylon, you are enjoying the wonders of chemistry. For these well-known products and many more have been created by chemists. In fact, we seem to be living in a Chemical Age when our whole way of life is affected by the amazing achievements of master scientists.

Life was very different a hundred years ago, and many of the changes have been brought about by chemistry. Chemists have made our houses more comfortable, our clothing more efficient and our food more wholesome. Without modern chemistry we could have no trains, cars or airplanes to speed us from place to place. There would be no motion pictures, radio or television. Worst of all we would not have the marvelous new medicines which now protect us against so many dread diseases. Without the wonders of chemistry we would be little better off than the cave men who lived thousands of years ago.

How have chemists achieved these wonders? On what scientific principles do they fashion new wonders for our everyday needs? How can they predict the chemical changes that enable them to make cloth out of wood and coal or a "miracle" drug out of blue-green mold?

Simply and directly Dr. Ira M. Freeman answers such questions as these in All About the Wonders of Chemistry. The result is a fascinating explanation of the part that chemistry is playing in our everyday lives.

-- From the book.