Charles-Augustin Coulomb was born at Angoulême, Charente, France, on June 14, 1736. He was educated as a military engineer, and graduated from the Ecole du Génie in 1761. He served at various posts, and ended up at Paris in 1776.

An interest in magnetism induced Coulomb to enter a competition sponsored by the Paris Academy of Science in 1777. He shared first prize for his paper on magnetic compasses and, in 1781, he received a double first prize for his work on friction. These honors helped get him elected to the Academy.

While Coulomb had been experimenting with compasses, he noticed slight errors were introduced by friction acting on the pivot that held the magnetized needle. He invented a compass that had its needle suspended by a fine thread. The thread was an improvement, but it twisted. Coulomb realized that the amount of twisting was related to the amount of...