George Washington Carver spent his life asking questions and looking for the answers. He gained a reputation as the farmer's best friend: He taught farmers about crop rotation-telling them to grow peanuts and sweet potatoes to "rest" their soil between cotton crops. And what could they do with all those peanuts? Carver developed more than three hundred peanut-based products-from milk to printers' ink-and more than a hundred ways to use sweet potatoes.