Electricity History Its Invention And Some Interesting Facts

Harnessing the power of the electron was the next most important step in our evolution. No other power source has so changed the life of the ordinary human, except perhaps the internal combustion engine, and even this needs electricity to operate.

Electricity heats our water, cooks our food, washes our dishes and clothing, and heats our homes. It also powers our industries, computers, toys, and virtually every modern convenience we possess.

The first steps to harnessing this revolutionary power source were taken in 1745 by a gentleman named Pieter van Musschenbroek. His invention of the Leydon Jar provided the first device which allowed scientists to store electricity and allow them to study it. It was used for public electrical demonstrations such as the popular one which involved lining people up and having them hold hands. The first one in the chain took hold of the lead from a Leyden Jar. The current passes through all the people in the chain, shocking only the last unfortunate in the chain. Fun for all except to poor unsuspecting victim in the rear.

Benjamin Franklin, one of the signers of the American Declaration Of Independence, realized the potential of this power source. He felt strongly enough, that he sold off all his business interests - his print shop, Poor Richard's Almanac, and his newspaper so he could have time to study it. Flying a kite in a thunderstorm wasn't just a foolish stunt. The kite was silk, the kite line was wet. The kite attracted a lightning strike, and the current flowed along the wet twine to a key tied on the end. This charged a Leyden Jar, storing the electricity Franklin needed for his experiments.

Franklin did important work in this field. He was the first to prove that lightning was electrical in nature, and his theories and experiments dominated the developing science of electricity for more than a century.

In 1780 Luigi Galvani discovered that two metals placed in contact with the muscle of a frog would generate electrical current. Galvani's friend, Alessandro Volta, an Italian physicist, was inspired by this to begin his own experiments. Beginning in 1794, he soon found that the metals alone would work. From this work, in 1800, he developed the first electric battery. This provided scientists with the first dependable, continuous electric current to work with. The battery generated electricity by chemical reaction, the Leydon jar needed to be charged with static or other electricity.

Hans Christian Ørsted's discovery in 1820 that a magnetic field was generated as it flowed through a wire and the further discovery by André-Marie Ampère that the field apparently was a circular one, producing in effect a cylinder of magnetism around the wire.

Michael Faraday used the findings of Ørsted and Ampère to further our knowledge of electricity. 1831 saw him build the first electric generator, and later the modern electric motor by reversing the current through the generator.

The work of these three men, and many other scientists working in the 18th and 19th centuries laid groundwork for much of Edison's work in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Edison's light bulb and other inventions, Marconi's telegraph, and Bell's telephone were all dependent upon the emerging science of electronics, and all have revolutionized the way we live