Born Alexander Bell in Edinburgh on March 3, 1847, he later adopted the middle name Graham out of admiration for Alexander Graham, a family friend. Many called Bell "the father of the Deaf." This title may be regarded as somewhat ironic due to his belief in the practice of eugenics. While both his mother and his wife were deaf, he hoped to one day eliminate hereditary deafness from the population. His family was associated with the teaching of elocution: his grandfather in London, his uncle i

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Archimedes is considered one of the three greatest mathematicians of all time along with Newton and Gauss. In his own time, he was known as "the wise one," "the master" and "the great geometer" and his works and inventions brought him fame that lasts to this very day. He was one of the last great Greek mathematicians. Born in 287 B.C., in Syracuse, a Greek seaport colony in Sicily, Archimedes was the son of Phidias, an astronomer. Except for his studies at Euclid's school in Ale

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Richard Arkwright the youngest of thirteen children was born in Preston in 1732. Richard's parents were very poor and could not afford to send him to school and instead arranged for him to be taught to read and write by his cousin Ellen. Richard became a barber's apprentice. However, he was an ambitious young man and had a strong desire to run his own company. In 1762

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Charles Babbage was one of the key figures of a great era of British history. Born as the industrial revolution was getting into its swing, by the time Babbage died Britain was by far the most industrialized country the world had ever seen. Babbage played a crucial rôle in the scientific and technical development of the period. Although born in London, Babbage came from an old Totnes family, and retained close links with the region all his life. The West Country, with its mi

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Louis was from a small town called Coupvray, near Paris—he was born on January 4 in 1809. Louis became blind by accident, when he was 3 years old. Deep in his Dad's harness workshop, Louis tried to be like his Dad, but it went very wrong; he grabbed an awl, a sharp tool for making holes, and the tool slid and hurt his eye. The wound got infected, and the infection spread, and soon, Louis was blind in both eyes. All of a sudden, Louis needed a new way to learn. He stayed at his old sch

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Leonardo was born on April 15, 1452, in the small Tuscan town of Vinci, near Florence. He was the son of a wealthy Florentine notary and a peasant woman. In the mid-1460s the family settled in Florence, where Leonardo was given the best education that Florence, the intellectual and artistic center of Italy, could offer. He rapidly advanced socially and intellectually. He was handsome, persuasive in conversation, and a fine musician and improviser. About 1466 he was apprenticed as a garzone (stud

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Edward G. Acheson (1856–1931) was raised in the coal fields of southwestern Pennsylvania. He left school at the age of 16 to help support his family after his father died, but devoted his evenings to scientific pursuits—primarily electrical experiments. In 1880 he had the temerity to attempt to sell a battery of his own invention to Thomas Edison and wound up working for Edison at Menlo Park. After a year he was sent to Europe to install electrical lighting systems in the Hotel de Ville in Antwe

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Thomas Adams first tried to change chicle into synthetic rubber products, before making a chewing gum. Thomas Adams attempted to make toys, masks, rain boots, and bicycle tires out of the chicle from Mexican sapodilla trees, but every experiment failed. One day in 1869, he popped a piece of surplus stock into his mouth and liked the taste. Chewing away, he had the idea to add flavoring to the chicle. Shortly after, he opened the world’s first chewing gum factory. In February 1871, Adam

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Dr. Ernst Alexanderson was the General Electric engineer who built a high-frequency alternator (a device that converts direct current into alternating current) that greatly improved radio communication. Prior to Alexanderson' alternator, radio was broadcast by what was called spark machines that used dots and dashes of signals or morse code. Ernst Alexanderson's alternator allowed radio to be broadcast in a continuous wave. In 1901, Swedish-born Ernst Alexanderson emigrated to the United

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Howard Hathaway Aiken was born March 8, 1900 in Hoboken, New Jersey. However he grew up in Indianapolis, Indiana where he attended the Arsenal Technical High School. After high school he studied at the University of Wisconsin where he received a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering. During college Aiken worked for the Madison Gas Company; after graduation he was promoted to chief engineer there. In 1935 Aiken decided to return to school. In 1939 he received a Ph.D. from Harvard Univers

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