Educated people laugh and sigh whenever news stories appear that report on surveys that test people’s basic knowledge of science, history, and other subjects that are taught from elementary school through college. Unfortunately, this widespread ignorance exposes the pathetic state of our educational system. The fact that teachers are poorly paid gets lots of attention, but another huge problem is the miserable state of modern teaching materials. The New York Review of Books published a review of current history textbooks that illustrates how bad these books are, and how consolidation in the textbook industry and forced pandering to moronic special interests have conspired to insure that children get a poor education in our schools. The crux of the article is that a grandmother from Virginia produced a better history text by herself than any of the designed-by-committee books currently being adopted by most school systems.