African American Astronomer And Mathematician

Young Math Genius.

The son of a free mulatto mother and an African father who had purchased his freedom, Benjamin Banneker gained fame as a mathematician and astronomer. He was born in 1731 and was mostly self-taught, as might be expected of an African American on an isolated Maryland tobacco farm during that time period, but it was clear that he had a genius for math. He became a local celebrity when, at the age of twenty-one, he borrowed a neighbor's pocket watch and re-created each gear out of wood, making a full-size clock—which continued to keep time for fifty years.

Astronomy.

When Banneker was forty, a well-to-do Quaker family moved into the area. Despite differences in their status, age, and color, he became friendly with eighteen-year-old George Ellicott, who lent him books and a telescope and encouraged his...