Benjamin Thompson

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Benjamin Thompson bigraphy, stories - American scientist

Benjamin Thompson : biography

March 26, 1753 – August 21, 1814

Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford (in ), FRS (March 26, 1753 – August 21, 1814) was an American-born British physicist and inventor whose challenges to established physical theory were part of the 19th century revolution in thermodynamics. He also served as a Lieutenant-Colonel in the Loyalist forces in America during the American Revolutionary War. After the end of the war he moved to London where his administrative talents were recognized when he was appointed a full Colonel, and in 1784 received a knighthood from King George III. A prolific designer, he also drew designs for warships. He later moved to Bavaria and entered government service there, being appointed Bavarian Army Minister and re-organizing the army, and, in 1791, was made a Count of the Holy Roman Empire.

Later life

Grave of Count Rumford (Paris) Statue of Thompson outside the library of his hometown, [[Woburn, Massachusetts. (A copy of the original in Munich.)]] Satirical cartoon by [[James Gillray showing a Royal Institution lecture on pneumatics with Davy holding the bellows and Count Rumford looking on at extreme right. Dr Garnett is the lecturer holding the victim’s nose]]

After 1799, he divided his time between France and England. With Sir Joseph Banks, he established the Royal Institution of Great Britain in 1799. The pair chose Sir Humphry Davy as the first lecturer. The institution flourished and became world famous as a result of Davy’s pioneering research. His assistant, Michael Faraday established the Institution as a premier research laboratory, and also justly famous for its series of public lectures popularizing science. That tradition continues to the present, and the Royal Institution Christmas lectures attract large audiences through their TV broadcasts.

Thompson endowed the Rumford medals of the Royal Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and endowed a professorship at Harvard University. In 1803, he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

In 1804, he married Marie-Anne Lavoisier, the widow of the great French chemist Antoine Lavoisier, his American wife–the one he abandoned in America upon the outbreak of the American Revolution–having died since his emigration. Thompson separated from his second wife after a year, but Thompson settled in Paris and continued his scientific work until his death on August 21, 1814. Thompson is buried in the small cemetery of Auteuil in Paris, just across from Adrien-Marie Legendre. Upon his death, his daughter from his first marriage, Sarah Thompson, inherited his title as Countess Rumford.

Honours

  • Colonel, King’s American Dragoons
  • Knighted, 1784.
  • Count of the Holy Roman Empire 1791
  • The crater Rumford on the Moon is named after him.
  • Rumford baking powder (patented 1859) is named after him, having been invented by a former Rumford professor at Harvard University, Eben Norton Horsford (1818–1893), cofounder of the Rumford Chemical Works of East Providence RI.

Bavarian maturity

The beer garden "Am chinesischen Turm" in the [[Englischer Garten in Munich]]

In 1785, he moved to Bavaria where he became an aide-de-camp to the Prince-elector Charles Theodore. He spent eleven years in Bavaria, reorganizing the army and establishing workhouses for the poor. He also invented Rumford’s Soup, a soup for the poor, and established the cultivation of the potato in Bavaria. He studied methods of cooking, heating, and lighting, including the relative costs and efficiencies of wax candles, tallow candles, and oil lamps.

He also founded the Englischer Garten in Munich in 1789; it remains today and is known as one of the largest urban public parks in the world. He was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1789. For his efforts, in 1791 Thompson was made a Count of the Holy Roman Empire, with the title of Reichsgraf von Rumford (English: Count Rumford). He took the name "Rumford" for Rumford, New Hampshire, which was an older name for the town of Concord, where he had been married, becoming "Count Rumford".