Heinrich Hertz was born into a well-to-do German family in Hamburg on February 22, 1857. He was an exceptionally talented student, doing equally well in the humanities and sciences. He read extensively, tried his hand at sculpting, and even built scientific apparatus on a lathe at home. After a year of military service, Hertz studied structural engineering in Munich, but gave it up for physics when he realized he had the ability to contribute something substantial to that field. At the age of 20 he wrote to his parents: "... I would rather be a great scientific investigator than a great engineer, but I would rather be a second-rate engineer than a second-rate investigator."

In 1878 Hertz enrolled at the University of Berlin to study under Hermann von Helmholtz, the leading German physicist of the time. He obtained his degree magna cum laude in 1880 with a theoretical...