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The Sound of Science - 'Benjamin Banneker'

Joe: Welcome to the Sound of Science on WNIJ. I’m Joe from the NIU Center for Black Studies. 

Gaylen: And I’m Gaylen. Today we’re going to go back in time to talk about Benjamin Banneker.

Joe: Banneker was born in 1731, during the time of slavery. He was a free man because his parents were both free at the time. However, rights for free African Americans were practically nonexistent. His accomplishments would be used to counter Thomas Jefferson’s claim that Blacks were naturally intellectually inferior.  Banneker and Jefferson regularly exchanged ideas and Jefferson eventually admitted his opinions of the mental abilities of blacks were wrong.

Gaylen: Bannekar was a largely self-taught mathematician, astronomer, compiler of almanacs and writer. One of his accomplishments was publishing almanacs for 6 consecutive years, from1792 to 1797. He built an accurate clock by hand after studying how gears work. He even taught himself how to use a zenith to record the movement of the starts and  accurately predicted a solar eclipse. . Banneker wasn’t always looking at the sky though. 

Joe: Early in his life, his family owned a farm near Baltimore where they sold tobacco. His crops flourished because of a  homemade irrigation system he designed to reroute water from nearby.  He also published research  on bees and calculated the cycle of the 17-year locust. 

Gaylen: But his most significant achievement is one everyone knows but don’t know his involvement. He surveyed the land to be used for the construction of the nation’s Capitol. Banneker ultimately used his position in society to fiercely advocate for abolition. Think about that!

Joe: Unfortunately, there isn’t a lot of information on Banneker's life. His astronomical journal is one of the few records of his life known to exist, but thanks to his contributions to the stem field, we were able to pick up where he left off on everything and continue the journey of making the world a better place. Stay tuned next week for more figures in the stem field during black history month. This has been the Sound of Science on WNIJ.

Gaylen: Where you learn something new every day.  

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