Michael Faraday was one of the greatest scientists of the 19th century. His early life closely paralleled that of Benjamin Franklin. Both were part of a large family; both were apprenticed in the printing trade; both read voraciously and became self-educated; and both loved science.

Faraday was born in Newington, Surrey, England, on September 22, 1791. His father, a blacksmith, could not afford a formal education for Michael, and so the boy received just the bare essentials and was apprenticed to a bookbinder. In some ways this apprenticeship was a stroke of good fortune for Michael because it gave him the opportunity to read all that he desired. He studied the articles about electricity in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, read a chemistry textbook, and was very interested in magnetism. In 1812 Faraday obtained tickets to attend the lectures of Humphry Davy at the Royal Institution. Faraday took 386 pages of notes and had...