Capo, Fran. It happened in New Jersey.

Globe Pequot. 211p. bibliog. index. c2004. 0-7627-2358-0. $9.95. JSA 

From the discovery of the bones of a dinosaur who lived 65 million years ago to the 1992 Guinness Book of Records creation of a 7' 8" tall clear glass bottle, It Happened in New Jersey bounces happily through five centuries of the state's history. The topics of the 30 six-to-seven-page chapters range from ghosts and devils (the NHL hockey team has its name for a reason) to Nast's first drawing of Santa Claus, from escapes from Indian attacks to death on the Hindenburg, from the blizzard of 1888 to the fire that almost destroyed Paterson in 1902. Some of the events are well known: the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby; the creation of a gambling Mecca in Atlantic City. Others have been less publicized: a 1916 explosion on the Jersey side of New York Harbor that was actually a German terrorist attack; the Nobel Prize-winning research that led to the validation of the "Big Bang" theory of the origin of the universe.

Smoothly written, the book is also brightened by touches of humor. As in others of this series, there is a bibliography and a considerable "Potpourri of New Jersey Facts." The publishers have, however, failed to include a single map to aid the reader. Patricia Moore, Brookline, MA